


Academy of Blood

by kuki



Category: Original Work
Genre: Angst, Bisexual Character, Blood Drinking, Class Differences, Explicit Sexual Content, High School, Multi, Nonbinary Character, Past Rape/Non-con, Psychic Abilities, Royalty, Slow Burn, Soul Bond, Vampire Hunters, Vampires, Werewolves, new kid
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-06-28
Updated: 2017-02-18
Packaged: 2018-04-06 14:03:21
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Rape/Non-Con, Underage
Chapters: 19
Words: 40,092
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4224513
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/kuki/pseuds/kuki
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Five years after the capture of a monster that brought werewolves, vampires, hunters, and humans together, Mason Ramos gets a good will scholarship to Horizon Academy. Horizon Academy is a school open exclusively to non-human children. There he gets involved with a power struggle within the Hunter ranks, the crown Prince of the vampires, and a girl with an unspeakable past.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

  * For [LucarioGuy15](https://archiveofourown.org/users/LucarioGuy15/gifts).



> An original work that is loosely based on an RP. Hoping to get some feed back from ya'll.

It was dark, and everything was damp with the passing rain. His sneaker splashed into a deep puddle, soaking his pant leg as he ran. The crowds didn’t notice him as he weaved through them, constantly looking over his shoulder. Red eyes stared at him, unmoving but still closer than the last time he had looked back only moments before. He was turning down a side street, it had less people, but there was more light coming from it.

A tall wooden fence came into view. It didn’t have a gate and it was too tall to climb. There were no gaps. Swearing, he turned to run back onto the main street.

The red eyes were standing under the porch light of the back door of someone’s house. Despite the light, it was hard to make out the figure’s features, he could only see the figure was male and giving him a toothy grin.

“Trapped like a wild animal.” The voice was deep and breathy, the male’s desire obvious.

Backing up to the fence, he looked around for somewhere to escape to, but there was nowhere to go. When he looked forward again the figure was only inches in front of him. He was panting as the eyes focused on his neck. His eyes closed tightly and he felt the hard body of the other male press against him. Lips brushed his neck…

And his alarm blared in his ear. He sat straight up, with a gasp. His eyes fell on the clock beeping obnoxiously and he sighed, falling back onto his pillows. He got up not long after and turned off the noise. Running his hands through his hair, he looked down.

“Cold shower it is…” He mumbled as he opened the door to his bathroom. It was the third morning in a row he had woken up to a dream like that. The red eyed man getting closer and closer in each progressive dream. As he let the water hit his back, he tried to explain them away with the fact that he was starting a new school and he was just nervous.

When he finished, he barely bothered to dry off as he started to get dressed. A starch white dress shirt and a white silk tie. He looked at himself in the mirror as he straightened the knot his mom had tied for him the night before. He stared at himself and sighed, realizing the problem. Once retrieving his thick-rimmed glasses, he fussed with his hair, trying to sort out the mess of it somewhat successfully. His brown eyes looked tired, half lidded with the tiredness of repeated nights of haunting dreams and surrounded by the dark circles of an internet addict.

Once he was sure he looked like he tried to make himself look like a person, he took his suit jacket off the back of his desk chair. The black jacket, though fitted, still felt loose on his thin frame. The emblem of his new school looked strange on him, but he brushed it off and gave himself a pep talk into the mirror.

“Listen here. You’re going to buck up and get through today. Who knows, maybe they’ll even like you and you’ll make some friends.” He nodded, half believing the words he told himself.

There was note next to the glass of milk and apple in the fridge his mother had left on her way to work. He glanced at it before downing the milk and taking a bite out of the apple. He didn’t appreciate his mother’s humor as he locked up the house.

A few more bites of the apple, and he straddled his bike and headed out, kicking the garden gate shut as he skidded onto the street. Several cars hooked their horns at him, so he got back on the sidewalk as soon as possible. A woman walking three small dogs swore at him.

His new school was a lot harder to find than he thought, especially when he realized he forgot his bag and had to go back to the house. He went down a few wrong streets which resulted in getting chased out of two alleys, one by a pack of stray dogs and the other by an angry Russian man with a broom handle.

When he finally found the school he stared at it, completely underwhelmed. With the kind of people that usually attended the school, he assumed he’d be attending something with a little more grandeur. It was pretty, for a high school, sure, but he was expecting a full medieval castle in the middle of the city. What he stared at was in the shape of a normal school, just made out of more expensive materials. The pillars holding up the awning looked a lot like marble and he was pretty sure he saw a grand chandelier in the lobby when he opened the door to the main office.

When he entered, the eyes of three strange looking women were on him. The one closest to him, impossibly thin and tall smiled at him. “How can I help you?”

“Uh…” His eyes went to the other two. A dark skinned woman with a lot of piercings was sharpening an ink pen as she stared at him curiously. The muscular one was typing on a computer, her fingers hitting the keys much harder than necessary. “I-I’m… the new…”

“The new civilian transfer student!?” Her smile widened and she turned to the other women. “Gina, can you please call Fox down to the office?”

The pierced woman grunted as she put down the pen and picked up the phone on her desk.

“The name is Mason Ramos, right?” The thin one was overly cheerful, as the muscular one stood up and walked over to a printer. “Before you start classes, there is just a little bit of paper work we need to go through.”

“I-I… I filled out a lot and set it in a few days ago…”

“No, that was really important stuff. This is silly stuff. Just signing that you received your student ID and have the student handbook and are aware of and responsible for school policies.”

“I got the handbook in the mail…”

“Did you read it Mr. Ramos?”

He nodded as he watched the other woman put a bunch of papers on the counter. His eyes fell on them. It was a relatively small stack, with a thick plastic ID with his picture on the top of the pile. While the thin woman explained where to sign, he stared at the ID. It had a lot of information that his old school ID definitely didn’t have.

While she was putting the papers through a scanner, the school side door opened and a boy his age sauntered in with his hands in his pockets. The boy had his curly hair undercut. His nose and ears were both pierced with over the top jewelry. His uniform was on less than properly: his sleeves were rolled up and he wasn’t even wearing his jacket, his tie was loose around his neck. There was a small golden II on his yellow tie that Mason was sure meant something.

“You our civie transfer?” The boy held out his hand with a smirk. “I’m Fox Sharpe. Second year head and your loyal and humble servant until you settle into the school.”

Mason took his hand cautiously. “Mason Ramos.”

“Come on, let’s get out of here before Gladys tries to get you to sign more paperwork.” Fox’s smile didn’t waver as he held open the door with his foot. He winked at the secretaries. “See ya later ladies.”

Once they were in the lobby, Mason’s suspicions were confirmed. There was a chandelier in the lobby. The floors were made of marble.

“Okay Mason buddy. Let’s get a tour underway and avoid classes as much as possible.” Fox slinked his arm around the new kid’s shoulders.

“How late was I?”

“Not very. You missed announcements and if we walk slow enough we can skip first period too.”

Mason frowned at him, but let the other boy push him into the halls of the school. It wasn’t much different than his last school. There were lockers, all with new paint and working locks, a gym, and a cafeteria. Everything looked more expensive, but it had the same things.

“Do you guys have after school stuff?” He said as Fox shut the door to the empty music room.

“Totally. Most of our clubs are fighting clubs. Different kinds of martial arts, the debate team. An art club and the theatre department… Sports teams.”

“They let you guys play in the high school league?”

As Fox snorted, the bell rang. “No. We have our own tournaments, and we also don’t separate by gender.”

Nodding, Mason turned to listen to the commotion of switching classes. “Can I go to class now?”

“If you insist. Classes aren’t so great anyway…”

“Are you kidding?” Mason’s eyes lit up as he smiled. “I get to learn about things that most of us don’t even imagine!”

“C’mon give me your class schedule.” Fox held out his hand looking bored. Once it was in his hand he looked over it and snorted. “Two of your seven classes are study halls. On my schedule they’re probably fighting and control classes, things that don’t apply to you.”

Mason took it from his hands and looked at the classes he did have. A history, which he was most excited about, math and English and biology and ethics. “I missed history? Man, I was looking forward to that.”

“Trust me, you’re going to want to skip Algebra. Heneofe is Satan in the flesh.” Fox smirked as he started walking towards the main part of the school. “But we have it together. We have ethics together too.”

After his first class at his new school Mason felt energized, even if the math teacher threatened his life, twice. There were a lot of people in his class, all of whom looked majorly on edge. “So, the tie colors, do they…”

“Separate us by species? You bet your ass they do.” He flicked at his own tie. “Yellow is for hunters. Brown is for the werewolves. And red…”

“Vampires.” Mason said with fascination, his eyes flitting to a group of girls with red ties gossiping by an open locker.

“Yep. Keep an eye out, my little human friend, this is a school, but some of us are hot heads.”

A boy with a brown tie sneered up at them, as if on cue. “What’s this Fox?”

“The human scholarship student. If you don’t want the humans to go to war with us, I suggest you be extra nice to him Boer.” Fox smirked in return.

“That mean I have to be nice to you too now?”

“Nah, you can continue being a dick to me.” Fox winked at him before nodding at Mason to continue walking.

Fox chuckled as lead him to his next class, grinning as he told him he’d save him a seat at lunch. When he looked into his classroom for English, he saw mostly brown ties, a couple of red, and only one yellow. Taking a deep breath, he walked in and sat next to the hunter girl.

As the class let out, he followed the girl to the cafeteria. When he stepped inside he looked around, surprised to see different colored ties mingling. Most tables were dominated by one color or another, but they weren’t unicolor. After he got his lunch, he looked around again and saw Fox sitting and laughing with a bunch of other people, a seat to his right free. The hunter looked over at him and waved for him to come over.

While he was walking over, he spotted a single table inhabited by one person, a girl and she was gorgeous.

 _Tall_ , was the first thing he noticed about her. She was extremely tall, for a girl, at least six inches taller than him. _Hair,_ was the second. It was almost the entire length of her and a deep red. Her large eyes were dark and sad. They looked on the verge of tears as they reflected the entire world around her. The curve of her thick and long lips was set to a frown, slightly open like she was getting ready to shout about what was making her so sad.

            When she looked up at him, where he was glancing at her curiously, her lips quickly turned to a smirk and her sad, reflective eyes were suddenly mocking him. “So, you’re the new kid?”

As she spoke, he immediately froze and gazed at her more directly. “Uh… Yeah…” He looked towards the table Fox was sitting at. The hunter looked horrified and shocked, still trying to get him to come over.

“Well, sit down.” The girl said as she picked up a curly fry and put it in her mouth. She looked at him challengingly, and he was certain that if he didn’t comply he’d die in some incredibly terrible manner. He set his tray down and looked back at Fox.

“I’m Mas-…”

“I know who you are. The vamps and the wolves have been cooing about you all morning.” She leaned forward and rested her chin on her fist. “I’m Vena.”

He looked down at her neck and found no tie. “Nice to meet you Vena.” There were so many questions rushing through his head, and none of them sounded like they wouldn’t offend her.

“So, you won the scholarship contest.” She mused, her eyes staring at him very intently. The intense stare made him uncomfortable as he started eating. “Did you have a particularly good essay?”

“Uh… I accidently sent in an essay on bee life cycles.” Mason choked out a nervous laugh as he stabbed at his salad.

“Well, the vampire society is very much like a hive. Perhaps the choosing committee thought it was poetic.”

“Doubt it, since I only got a C on it when I turned it in for its actual purpose.”

“Then perhaps your grades?”

“I barely have a B average.”

“Teacher recommendations?”

“Only one of my teachers knew my name.”

Vena hummed and her lips returned to their very sharp frown. “What about your family? Do you have a large family?”

“No? It’s just me and my mom…”

“I see.” She stared at him for a while, looking intrigued. When he picked up his juice box and stuck the straw through the top, she rolled her eyes. “If you wanted apple juice, you grabbed the wrong thing.”

“What?” He looked at the box that he barely looked at when he put it on his tray. “Synthetic blood?”

“You have to be more careful about what you pick up around here. You’re lucky you didn’t get the werewolf meal, the meats always barely cooked.” She picked up her unopened juice box. “Have mine.”

“Are you sure?”

“I wasn’t going to drink it anyway.”

“Thanks…”

Once he had started back on his lunch, she smiled at him. “How are you liking Horizon Academy so far?”

“Uh, I mean… I’m honestly terrified, but everyone’s been super nice to me… and your classes are so… different from my old school. It’s a lot to expect me to adjust in one day.”

“No one is expecting you to adjust in one day.” Vena then stood up and he noticed she was wearing pants, unlike every other girl in the school. “I’ll see you around Mason. Who knows, maybe we’ll have a class together.”

Once she had left the cafeteria, Fox was sitting next to him, touching his chest like he was checking for injuries. “Are you okay? What did you guys talk about? Did she…”

“I’m fine…” Mason stared at Fox strangely. Sure, Vena was pretty intimidating and pretty damn weird, but she couldn’t’ve been that bad. “She just asked me about the scholarship and how I liked the school. Even saved me from drinking synthetic blood.”

“But…”

“Vena Cava is a _very_ damaged girl.” Another male voice said behind them. Mason turned and saw a boy, older than him and Fox. He looked a lot like Fox, if Fox didn’t look like a delinquent. A dagger pin was on his breast pocket, under the school symbol. “She’s hardly spoken a word voluntarily since she returned to school.”

“Mason, this is my older brother, Blain. He’s the head of the hunters, and the president of the student council.”

“Nice to meet you…” Mason put his head down. Blain was even more intimidating than Vena was. She gave off stay-away vibes and Blain gave off very strong come-at-me vibes.

“Did you ask her anything?” Blain asked, his eyebrows rising with curiosity.

“No.” He glanced up at the older boy and then his new friend. “She seemed like she didn’t want to be asked questions.”

“Be careful around her, if you insist continuing to associate with her. I’d advise staying away from her completely. Safe studies Mason.” Blain then left the cafeteria.

Fox sighed beside him, and Mason stared at him. “Do you think I should stay away from Vena?”

“For your sake, probably. But Vena… Vena reaching out to you might be a sign that she’s ready… and maybe you can help her get out of her shell.”

The hunter waited for Mason to dispose of his trash, then escorted him to his study hall, which he’d be sitting in for the next two periods. It left him plenty of time to work on his homework, and look through the textbooks in the room, which was an upper history class. While he was working on his math homework, he started listing questioning absently in his notebook. Questions about the school, about Fox, and Vena, and vampires and hunters. By the time he got up from his second study hall, he had three pages full of questions he didn’t want to ask.

During biology, he got paired with a bubbly, blonde vampire that wouldn’t shut up about a ball she had gone to over the weekend. Her favorite two parts that she kept telling Mason about were all the cute boys and how pretty her dress was. She asked if he’d ever attended a ball, and when he sheepishly said ‘no’, her eyes lit up.

“Oh my gosh! You should definitely come with me to the next one!” She squealed, bouncing up and down on her stool.

“I don’t really think…”

“It’s completely safe! There’s people food and no one is going to try to drink your blood, promise.”

The hunter at the bench in front of him, turned around and snorted. “Get it off it Michie, the human doesn’t want to go with you.”

His werewolf partner glanced back at him. “Weren’t you sitting with Vena at lunch today?”

“She asked me to sit with her.” Mason said, suddenly very defensive. Was it a crime to sit with her?

The two boys shared a glance with each other before whispering something and howling with laughter. Michie glared at him. “So, she’s more your speed then?”

Friendly chatter ended after that. When the period was almost over, Vena came in the room and the teacher glanced up at her. Mason watched as the two talked quietly, but put his head down when they both look back at him. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw Michie sneer up at Vena. With a deep breath, he raised his hand.

“Yes Mason?” The teacher stared at him.

“Uh… I’d be okay with being Vena’s partner, and Michie could find a group of three.”

After asking both girls if it was alright, the teacher made it so.

On the way out Vena walked next to him. “Thanks. If I had to pick a group of three, I’d be working by myself.”

“Michie is pretty annoying, so really it was for my own sake.” He grinned at her. “But you’re welcome.”

She smiled back at him. “Where are you heading?”

“Ethics. Sounds fun.”

“Which ethics class? Because there is no reason for you to take one.”

“What do you mean?”

“We offer three ethics classes, hunter, vampire, and werewolf. Hunters learn about the hunter code and when it’s okay to kill a vamp or wolf without an order. Vampires learn about how best to ask for blood and under what circumstances it’s okay to take blood without permission.”

“What about the werewolves?”

“No idea. What happens in ethics class, stays in ethics class.”

Before Mason could ask her how she knew about vampire and hunter ethics, Fox came up and nodded at Vena, who just rolled her eyes at him. “So Mason, how were your two hours of study hall?”

“Mind numbing.” Mason groaned. “But, Vena and I are lab partners in bio.”

“Really?” Fox looked over at Vena again who nodded.

“Please tell him there’s no reason for him to be taking hunter ethics.” She said with a sharp edge to her voice.

He blinked at her before looking at Mason.

“If I have to take one more study hall, I’m going back to human world where there are art classes I can fill my schedule with.”

“At least ask her why you’re in it.”

When Mason approached the desk, the teacher, a sharp edged older woman, just pointed at the empty desk next to Fox and in front of Vena. He looked back at them and just shrugged.

Well the bell rang, she stood and stared at him. “Mr. Ramos. Welcome.”

“Uh…”

“I’m going to ask you a few questions, and if you answer half of them correctly, you may go to the office and get a new class for your schedule.” She moved around her desk and leaned against it. “What is the procedure when a hunter finds a person, dead or living, that they suspect is victim to a nonhuman?”

“Call for back up?”

“No. Fox, what do we do?”

Fox looked shocked, but glanced at Mason. “Clean up the scene and take the body to the nearest hunter station as discretely as possible.”

“If a target has a hostage, what should the hunter take care of first?”

“Save the hostage.”

“Wrong again. Vena?”

“Kill the target.”

“Now, the vampire or werewolf is dead or in custody, depending on the mission, and the human is alive, but injured. What do you do with them?”

“Get them medical attention?” The teacher just stared him down and he sighed. “Wrong again?”

“Yes Mr. Ramos. I’m not going to ask the rest of the questions, since you’ve already answered over half incorrectly.” She moved to the chalkboard. “You are in this class because it is imperative for you to know our motives. We protect humanity, but in the face of a threat to humanity, one human is often insignificant. One of our own is often insignificant.”

The rest of the class was spent on how to identify whether or not a human was willingly giving their blood or if they were being forced. It was information Mason hoped he never had to use in his entire life.

When the class let out, Fox bailed, saying that he had a meeting for after school. Vena pulled her phone out of her pocket and groaned. “I’m going to rip him a new one…”

Mason raised his eyebrows at her.

“My ride’s going to be late, as usual.”

“Do you want me to wait with you? I don’t have anything but homework to do tonight.”

She just shook her head. “I’ll be fine.”


	2. Chapter 2

It was four am when Mason woke up, feeling the wet heat in his pajama pants. He groaned at the realization that he had yet another dream about some imaginary vampire. The dreams were definitely escalating if the mess in his boxers was any clue. With an annoyed glance at his alarm clock, he got up and got a way too early shower. Once he was done, he laid back in his bed, staring at the school uniform he had draped on his desk chair.

He was awake when his alarm made its god-awful noise. Without even bothering to think about how tired he was, he got up and got ready.

When he made it downstairs, he found the bread next to the toaster. At least she wasn’t trying to be funny again. Jokes like that only worked once.

Fox was standing in the lobby, his eyes scanning the crowd of students that came into the building. His eyes were narrowed enough, suspicious enough to bore holes in the other students’ heads, until Mason walked through the door. He beamed at the human and started to walk next to him.

“So you show me around and suddenly we’re best friends?” Mason glanced at him.

“You okay? You look pretty out of it.” Fox’s smile fell off his face.

“Ugh, I’ve just been having trouble sleeping lately. I’m fine.” Before Fox could respond, Mason ran into someone’s back. He immediately started to apologize.

The boy turned around and smiled at Mason. His uniform, unlike Fox’s, was on completely proper, a gold droplet under the school crest on his breast pocket. He outstretched his hand, his grin increasing. Mason stared at the manicured hand, purple nail polish and three over the top silver rings drained the air of propriety from him.

“You must be the scholarship student, Mason.” His voice was like liquid sex and sounded familiar to the human. “Julien Cardia.”

Mason felt weak in the knees as he took the hand of the other student, a jolt of something went through him at the contact, but he was still taking in his beauty. His hair was long enough to cover his eyes, white, and perfect. His eyes appeared to be lavender, but were probably blue, just under weird lighting. Like Fox, he had several piercings in either of his ears and a bar through one of his eyebrows. The new kid only turned his gaze away when he heard Fox sigh heavily next to him and tap his foot a few times. Julien took his hand out of Mason’s and winked at him before turning and continuing down the hall.

Mason tried to be excited as he walked into his history class, but was too exhausted to care how much he was looking forward to the class the day before. He smiled at Vena when he noticed her, sitting in the empty seat next to her.

“You came back. Good for you.” She winked at him, opening up her notebook and pulling a pen seemingly from nowhere.

“Nobody’s scared me away yet.”

The boy behind him, a werewolf named John, snorted. “This class is going to scare you away.”

Mason glanced at Vena, who looked at him innocently and shrugged.

Julien came in just before the bell rang. And that’s when Mason realized that he was probably not really cut out for his new life. History should’ve been renamed ‘pissing match’. The teacher would bring up one piece of history about vampires. If it was good either Vena or John would stand up spout how it was actually terrible. If it was bad, Julien hissed and defended his species. John defended the werewolves, and Vena the hunters. Halfway through the class, the teacher just sat on his desk and stared at the three teenage nonhumans in resignation.

After class let out, he waited for Vena to pack up. He noticed that she was wearing a proper uniform. The skirt was longer than what most of the girls wore and she sported leggings underneath, but it was better than jeans. She was also wearing an orange tie. What could orange mean? It was clear that Vena was a hunter, or affiliated with hunters, but…

“Is it always like that? The three of you fighting over how one species’ history screwed over the others?”

She snorted and glanced up at him. “Most of the time. Once we actually all agreed on the lesson, but last week it was so bad that John and Julien came to blows. Julien’s suspension only ended today.”

“He got suspended and he’s still head of the vampires?”

“How’d you know?”

“The pin on his breast pocket.” Mason shrugged, waiting for her to leave first before following her. “Judging by your being in a hunter ethics class and defending hunter actions in history, you’re very closely related to hunters, but by the tie, you’re not a hunter.”

“You’re too nice to just ask me so you’re going to analyze all my actions and wardrobe?” She raised her eyebrows at him. “Keep your analysis for history discussions.”

“Do you just want me to ask you?”

“No.” She stopped. “I’ll see you at lunch. Tell Fox to take the stick out of his ass when you see him.”

He waved at her as she went into a classroom that seemed to be filled with only vampires. Not trying to think about it, he headed to algebra. Fox only cackled when he received Vena’s message.

“You know, I take back what I said about not hanging out with her. She’s been acting more like herself than she has been in years.”

“I’ve barely known her for an entire day. What difference could I make?”

“I think it’s just because you literally have no idea about anything, making you comfortable for her to be around.”

Mason just shook his head as the teacher started the dreadful lesson.

As he walked into English, he found Julien sitting next to the desk he had claimed the day before. Julien apparently noticed too, because he looked up at him when he came in. The vampire’s eyes followed him the entire way to his seat and it made Mason extremely uncomfortable.

“Well, hello again Mason.” The vampire grinned at him. Mason had to look away to hide the sudden heat to his face at the sound of the other boy’s voice.

“Hey Julien. Uh…”

Laughing quietly, Julien leaned on his hand and batted his eyelashes at the human. “Sit with me at lunch?”

“Oh, I promised Vena I’d sit with her, sorry.” Mason looked up as the teacher started writing things on the chalkboard. “But I guess you could sit with us too, if Vena says it’s okay.”

Mason could feel the vampire’s eyes on him the entire class, but he didn’t have enough courage to look over at him until the end of the class. By then, Julien had stopped staring at him to put his stuff in his bag.

The human was the first person to get out of the food line, since he grabbed whatever was in the empty line, which happened to be salad. He sat at the table he and Vena had sat at the day before and spotted her bag. Fox soon joined him, sitting next to him and digging into his burger without even a greeting. Julien sat next to him with just a juice box, the same type he accidently picked up the day before. He gave Fox a disgusted look before sticking the straw through the top.

“Is that all you’re having for lunch?” Mason asked as he stabbed a particularly crunchy piece of lettuce.

“If I eat too much people food, I’ll get fat.” Julien pouted at him before putting the straw in his mouth. “But seriously, I can only eat one meal of _real_ food a day or I’ll get violently ill.’

Fox snorted on the other side of the human. “Or is the prince’s palate too delicate for school food.”

“Well, yes, there is that too.”

Vena sat down, looking extremely annoyed and without a tray. “Ten fucking minutes in line and they’re out of fries.”

“You should really eat more than just fries for lunch Vena.” Mason looked at her with concern. “The salad line is empty.”

Julien and Fox both chuckled on either side of him. He looked at them with furrowed eyebrows before looking back at Vena. She just darted her eyes away. “I’ll be fine until I get home. Thanks for the concern.”

Her eyes then glared in turn at the two nonhuman males. “Who said you could sit here?”

They both pointed at Mason, who immediately put his hands up in defense. “I told you guys could sit here if Vena said you could!”

“Whatever, they’re already sitting.” Vena sighed, leaning across the table.

It was awkwardly silent as Julien drank from his juice box, and the other two males ate their meals. Vena stared at the table before looking up at Fox.

“Did Mason deliver my message?”

“He did. What exactly did I do to get the stick up my ass?” Fox smiled at her softly.

“Telling Mason not to hang out with me, and especially letting your brother talk the headmaster into calling Peirce to have him tell me not to hang out with him.” Vena glared at him and Fox’s eyes went wide.

“He didn’t. Fuck, Vena, I’m so sorry. I’m going to sucker punch him later.” Fox ran his hands over his face as he stared at Vena.

Julien laughed as he glanced over at the table where Blain was sitting. “What did Peirce say?”

“You guys know Peirce, he very calmly, and politely told the headmaster to go get fucked with a steel I beam.” Vena said blandly. The two boys both laughed, but Mason was confused.

“Who’s Peirce?”

“Peirce Gestalt. Vena’s legal guardian, and the number one hunter currently working.” Fox explained with a shrug. “He’s seriously over protective of her.”

“Gestalt? I think I’ve heard of him. He’s the guy who caught the vampire that was killing all those human girls, right?”

“Yeah, he’s the guy.” Vena looked angry when he said that and Mason wasn’t sure why. Her guardian was a hero, what reason would she have to be mad about it?

“It wasn’t just killing them, Mason.” Julien said, squashing the box in his hand.

“And it just wasn’t human girls.” Fox added as he pushed away what was left of his lunch.

Then Mason understood why Vena was so angry with him for asking about it. “I know that… I just didn’t want to… It’s not something I wanted to say out loud.” He glanced at Vena who had grown increasingly uncomfortable. “Why don’t we change the subject? This isn’t lunch room…”

“I agree. You were looking forward to having history, was it everything you wanted and more?” Fox grinned at him. Mason glared back at him.

“You knew that Vena and Julien spend the entire class yelling at each other and the head werewolf, didn’t you?”

Fox just continued to smile as he looked away and shrugged his shoulders innocently.

“Why do you guys fight anyway?”

“Because the written information…” Vena started the tension still in her shoulders but no longer on her face.

“He means why it’s the three of us and not the entire class going to blows.” Julien looked at her like she was a stupid child. Then he grinned at Mason. “It’s because the three of are the future heads of our species.”

Vena snorted. “Yeah, right. They’re going to let me be in charge of the Hunter Judiciary.”

“The last time they voted, it was 7 to 3 vote for you to be the next leader.” Fox informed quietly. “I mean, it didn’t actually mean much since my dad currently has veto power.”

“What, he still has the power of a war time leader? Doesn’t fucking surprise me.” She accused with a deep frown. “And he’s not really your father Fox.”

Fox put his hands up in defeat before Mason turned to Julien. “Wait, so you’re… The fucking prince of vampires?!”

Julien nodded like it was obvious. “Of course. You didn’t know the royal family’s name when you heard it?”

Mason looked at Fox. “Why didn’t you tell me?”

“You didn’t ask.”

“What do I have to do if I want information from you?” Mason stared at Julien.

“Assume that 80% of what I tell you is complete bullshit.”

“The three of you are going to give me an ulcer.”

“At least you’re going to have an interesting school life Mason.” Vena got up, grabbing her bags. “I’ll see you in biology.”

Julien stood up. “We’re going to the same place, you could wait for me.” She didn’t.

During his first period of study hall, he was in the guidance office looking for other classes that he could take during his two study halls. There wasn’t much to choose from, and nothing to choose from he could take during his second study period. That period was reserved for fighting or ability control classes and anyone who couldn’t take them were locked in study hall. To fill his first study hall there was one opening in a home economics class. He was surprised to see that the academy had a cooking class.

When he walked into biology, everyone looked uncomfortable. The vampires had their hands over their mouths. Werewolves were scratching at the slate of the lab benches. The hunters were all tensed up, looking straight ahead. Vena looked the most uncomfortable.

“You okay?” Mason asked as he sat next to her. It was obvious that she wasn’t. She was sitting on the edge of the stool, more standing than sitting. Her tie was loose around her neck. He noticed blood on the collar of her shirt. “What happened?”

“Accident during class.” Vena sighed as she turned to look at him. “I’ll be fine.”

“You don’t look fine.”

She pulled her collar down, exposing her neck. “Did it heal yet?”

“Uh, I don’t see anything… So I guess so.”

When the teacher came in, Mason glanced up at her. The woman was staring at Vena. “Ms. Cava, please go home. You’re upsetting the rest of the class.”

“Well maybe that’s the class’s problem and not mine. I’m fine.” Vena glared forward as she opened her notebook. “You’re always lecturing me about missing class, and when I want to be in class you tell me to leave?”

Without commenting further, she began the lesson, firing up the projector. While she was teaching, Mason noticed the other students turning to stare at Vena. The vampire’s eyes were red, and the werewolves’ were yellow. He glanced at Vena and she snorted.

“I’m extremely aware that I’m being stared at. It would make me feel a lot better if you didn’t stare at me too.”

He looked down and sighed. “Yeah, sorry.”

Ethics was a little less tense. Mason assumed that without any vampires that were attracted to the dried blood, the hunters were much better at controlling their own urges. However, Vena wasn’t any less agitated by the discussion of the class. They were talking about the last question Mrs. Lament asked him on his first day. Apparently, the answer was ‘check for signs of turning’.

“How do humans get turned into a vampire or werewolf?” Mason asked when she called on him. She looked confused. “I didn’t even know you could be turned, I thought you could only be born as either.”

“Ah, I see, that information hasn’t been made public to humans.” She paced to be closer to Mason’s desk. “Only some vampires and some werewolves can turn humans. Alpha werewolves can turn with their bite. High ranking vampires can turn humans by allowing, or forcing, a human to drink their blood. With alpha bites, the possibilities are turn or die. Vampires are more complicated. If a low ranking vampire were to turn a human, it may result in the human liking rarer meat than usual for a few weeks but otherwise staying human.”

“Can hunters be turned, since you’re basically human?” Mason felt the words roll off his tongue and winced as soon as they were out of him. He noticed Vena flinch at the question as every eye in the room moved to her.

“It is possible, but our biology makes it difficult for the two things to exist within us. One in fifty hunters survive an alpha bite. One in a thousand people survive being turned into a vampire.”

Without missing a beat, she continued her lecture. The second the last bell rang, Vena was up and out of the classroom before the last chime. Fox stood at his desk, waiting for him to gather his stuff. Mason looked up at him. “Hey, what are you doing tonight?”

“Uh, finding an excuse not to ride home with my brother, avoiding going home. Why?”

“Maybe you could come over to my place for a while, and we could hang out?” The human shrugged. “I was going to invite Vena, but somehow now I think she wouldn’t be very amicable to the idea.”

Snorting, Fox picked up his bag. “Yeah, being in someone else’s house, especially a guy or a human’s house… she’s probably go off her rocker. But, I’d love any excuse to not go home.”


	3. Chapter 3

Fox was intrigued by many of the things they saw on the walk home. Mason was pretty sure he was doing it to annoy him, as he pointed at a tree. The human just glared at him until he put his hands up with a snide grin. “Want me to push your bike for you?”

“I can handle it. We’re almost there.”

“Why do you live so far away from the school…?” Fox groaned, putting his hands behind his head.

“I lived farther from my old school, but I took the bus.”

“Bro, that’s terrible.”

He fumbled for his keys as his house came into sight. Fox looked at it like he was going to comment, but didn’t when Mason glared at him. They hung out for a while, eating junk food and playing through one of Mason’s games he had already beaten by himself.

“Hey Fox… what do you know about Vena?” Mason asked as he got up to turn off his Xbox.

“Everything. That’s the problem. There isn’t a person at school who doesn’t know every little thing about her life.” Fox put his face in his hands. “It’s why she reached out to you. You have no idea what she is, what she’s been through.”

“She’s a hunter that was turned into a vampire, right? By the vampire that was terrorizing the city?” When Fox didn’t reply, it was all the answer Mason needed. “I refuse to treat her any differently.”

“Then don’t let anyone tell you any details.” Fox looked at him seriously. “And you’re going to have to try to be her knight in shining armor, fuck knows she needs one.”

“Against what?” Mason was confused, but the hunter just stood up and mumbled about leaving.

The next morning Vena was absent from history. Julien walked with him after class and grinned at him. “Figures she’d miss today. After what happened yesterday…”

“What exactly did happen?”

“Nothing I’d say out loud, but let’s just say she was probably ravenous when she got home.”

Before Mason could reply, or make it to algebra, his name was being called over the intercom. He groaned and looked at Julien. “What did I do?”

“Nothing, the headmaster just wants to talk to you. Good luck.” The vampire winked at him and continued walking as Mason turned.

When he entered the office, there was a lot of yelling coming from a tall man banging on the desk. He was wearing a long black coat, with a shotgun strapped to his back. His dark hair was long, held back in a messy ponytail. His eyes ventured to the human for a mere second, long enough for Mason to see the dark blue eyes and the deep scar between them.

“How many times have you let this happen? No one ever does a damned thing when something happens to her!” The man continued to yell at the three secretaries. “If it was any other student, there’d probably be a death march for the person who fucking did it! But people attack her and you pretend it never even happened!”

Mason saw the door marked ‘Headmaster’ open. The woman that came out was short and athletic. She wore a suit dress and had her hair up in a slick bun. Her eyes were fierce as she looked at the man.

“Peirce. It is regrettable how the students see your ward, but my hands-…”

“Are tied? You say that every fucking time! Either you start punishing people that hurt her, or I take her out of this fucking school!” Peirce pointed an accusatory finger at her.

“We both know that is not an option. If you take her out of school, we know what the judiciary will do with her. She’s safest here.”

“Safest? How can someone feel safe in a place where everyone couldn’t give a shit if they got knocked around? It’s one thing to try to protect her and fail, it’s another to just fucking give up!” Mason said from where he was standing near the door.

Both adults turned to look at him. The head _mistress_ looked shocked, and angry. Peirce had a grin on his face before he turned to look at the woman again. “It’s pretty bad when a human kid understands something better than you do.”

Before she could speak, Peirce picked a ridiculously large and shabby Stetson up from the counter. “Either you work on protecting Vena, or I’m going to start doing to you what those monsters do to her, to you.” And then he was gone.

It took a while before the headmistress shook the fear out of her eyes. When she did, she looked at Mason. “We’ll talk later. Please go back to class.”

The rest of the day was strange without Vena. Mason sat with Fox with some of his prefect friends. Three hunters, two werewolves, and a vampire. He looked across the room to see Julien look away too slowly. He wasn’t interested in the conversation the others were having so he left early.

The rest of his classes were different without Vena, though it was a little bit more relaxed. It annoyed him that the rest of the school was suddenly more at ease without her. He wondered what she was doing at home.

 

“You reek of blood.” A female voice said as soon as Peirce opened the door. “You need to get a shower.”

“I’m glad to see you finally got out of bed.” He hung up his coat and walked around to look at her where she was laying on the couch. Vena looked up at him.

“My room smells like your blood.” She sighed, sitting up.

“The entire apartment smells like someone’s blood all the time. I thought you’d gotten over that by now.” He sat next to her, making her move her feet closer to her. “How are you doing?”

“I could’ve gone today.” She rolled her eyes at him as she switched off the TV.

“I went instead and gave your headmistress a piece of my mind.”

Vena groaned and dropped her head back over the armrest. “I fucking hate you. Do you know what your little outburst could mean for me?”

“I also met your little boyfriend. He’s pretty protective of you.”

“He’s not my boyfriend Peirce. He’s barely my friend.” She stood up and walked over to the tiny kitchen.

“What are you doing? You know nothing in there is going to do anything for you.”

“Shut up, okay? I don’t need reminded about what I am.” The fridge door slammed shut with a crash as everything fell out of the door shelves.

“I’m sorry.” Peirce sighed as he stood up. “You should invite him over after school. He really cares about you.”

“Go get your fucking shower before the living room smells like your blood too!”

“Is that a promise?” He grinned and pulled her towards him by her hand, which he kissed gently. She pulled her hand away out his with a grimace, not even bothering to look at him. “Try not to beat yourself up, okay kiddo?”

When her bedroom door slammed shut, he swore at himself and went into his own room. He came out a while later, wearing sweats and toweling off his hair. His eyes went to the fridge, wondering if there was any beer left. Opening the last bottle, he leaned back on the counter. Vena’s door opened and he sat the bottle down to look over at her. “Look, I’m sorry. I got carried away…”

“It’s fine Peirce.” She walked over to the kitchen and sat up on the counter next to him. She curled herself up so she fit more comfortably under the upper cabinets. “I’m sorry too. I know ho-…”

“You never need to apologize you to me, you know that. I’d do anything for you.” He turned and put his hand on her shoulder, ever so gently. She turned her head towards him.

“Peirce, you shouldn’t have to. I hate being a burden on you.” She closed her eyes. “I shouldn’t be your responsibility.”

“You’re not a burden, Vena.”

“You say that every fucking time.” She got off the counter. “Of course I’m a burden. Why can’t you just admit how inconvenient it is having me here?”

“Because it isn’t.” He grabbed her wrist and made her look at him. “You always walk away before I can tell you why.”

She glared at him as he let her go. “Fine. Why isn’t it an inconvenience?”

“You don’t eat a lot. It would kill me with guilt thinking about where you’d be if you weren’t here. I wasn’t the best equipped to deal with you when we first met, but I think nobody else could take care of you now. And I love… having you here. It would honestly be so lonely without you.”

When she looked at him again, she was on the verge of tears. “God! I hate you. I’m going to bed.”

“Sleep good Vena.” He smiled at the back of her head as she slammed her bedroom door again.

The next morning, Mason was greeted in the lobby by Julien’s wicked grin. He yawned as he walked over to the vampire. “Morning Julien.”

“You look tired. You need to stop trying to mimic a vampire’s sleep schedule.”

“Why isn’t this school at night anyway?”

“Who knows. I blame the hunters.” Julien shrugged and opened the door for him. “Vena’s back. And looks cranky.”

Mason smiled at her as he sat down. She glared at Julien. “I am cranky. You try spending all day with Peirce.”

“He seems to really care about you.” Mason frowned at her as he glanced at Julien, who looked more amused than he should have.

“He’s annoying about it. The man is twenty-five, he could act his age.” Vena sighed and leaned back in her seat.

“Good morning class.” The teacher walked in and set a pile of papers on the desk. “Before I give out today’s assignment, I wanted to take the chance to remind you all that a very important anniversary is coming up this weekend, and to celebrate we will be having an assembly for half of the day on Monday.”

Mason looked at Julien for an explanation, but the vampire was too busy staring at Vena who looked like she was about to run out and be sick. After class he smiled at her, even though she still looked like she felt sick. “How about we skip all our classes on Monday? Go do something fun?”

She raised her eyebrows at him. “Somehow I feel like your idea of fun is very different than mine.”

“Do you even have a sense of fun Cava?” Julien sneered at her.

“Bite me, your highness.” Vena glared back at him as she got up.

“Been there done that. Wasn’t much fun, too many bad memories.” Julien sighed and watched them as they headed out.

At lunch, Vena groaned as Mason asked another question. “Julien, do me a favor and bring in some books on vampires, werewolves, and hunters so Mason stops asking me.”

“Why do you assume I have books on that?” Julien raised an eyebrow as he put his empty blood box on Mason’s tray.

“Because you live in a palace with a library bigger than my apartment?”

“Fair point. I’ll grab one on each and bring them in for him tomorrow. It’ll give him something to do over the weekend.”

“Or we could give him something to do this weekend. We could do a boys day.” Fox grinned as he sat next to Mason.

“Last time I checked, the term boy applied to me very loosely by your standards, hunter.” Julien leaned on the table to bat his ridiculously long eyelashes at Fox.

“You can come along, under the condition that you don’t wear a dress.”

“Hmm what about a skirt and a blouse?”

“Just wear pants. Please?”

“Alright, for to preserve your misguided sense of what it means to be a man.” Julien sighed and glanced at Mason.

“You wear dresses?”

“His highness, the prince of vampires, is what you humans would call gender fluid.” Vena shrugged at the human. “He’s very pretty in a dress with a little bit of makeup.”

“Shut up Vena, you’re going to make me blush.” Julien glared at her and she just smiled and went back to her fries.

“I wouldn’t mind if you dressed however you wanted to Julien.” Mason smiled at him. “But do you want to call you by different pronouns or something?”

“Nah, he/his are great.”

“What the hell are you guys talking about?” Fox groaned, looking to Vena for an explanation.

“Maybe you should bring Fox in a book on gender and sexuality while you’re searching through your library.”

Julien scoffed. “He can get information about that online, unless hunters scoff at the idea of computers?”

Fox glared at Julien but didn’t say anything as he finally started to eat his food.

“So are we actually doing a guys’ day this weekend or?” Mason asked looked at the two on either side of him. He noticed Vena get up and sent a small wave at her.

“Sure, but it has to be Sunday.” Julien shrugged.

“Why?” Fox sounded annoyed as he chewed.

“There’s a very important event tomorrow night, and I’ll be sleeping all day Saturday to recover from it.”

“What one of those balls that you vampires are always throwing?”

“Worse.” Julien groaned. “A meeting with all of the nobles in the city.”

“Ouch.”

“Cool, lets meet around noon, at the park.” Mason smiled.

“Which park?”

“The central park, obviously.” Julien rolled his eyes as he got up. “Maybe one of these days that girl will wait for me.”

“Yeah and maybe vampires will no longer need to drink blood to survive.” Fox snorted as he started piling his trash on Mason’s tray.

“One can only hope Fox.”

Then both non-humans were gone and Mason was left to get rid of all the trash.

When he got home, he laid down on the couch. Mason was too exhausted to make it up to his room or even take off his shoes. He hadn’t been getting enough sleep because of his sex nightmares.

“Hey kiddo.”

He jumped at the voice and stared at his mother who had entered the room without a sound. “Why are…”

“I always get home earlier on Thursdays.” She chuckled, mug of coffee firmly between her hands. “We haven’t had much time to talk since you started at your new school.”

“Sorry mom, I’m kind of tired from school… I might take a nap.”

His mother’s smile fell as she nodded. “Alright. Are you making friends, at least? I know they’re not human but…”

“Yeah. I made a couple. I’ll bring them by some time.” He smiled at her as he sat up. “Most of the students are really nice. Most of the teachers are terrifying.”

She nodded again. “I’m glad. I’ll wake you up when dinner’s ready and you can tell me more about them.”

“Sounds good Mom.”

He’d been having the dreams for over a week, and he still hadn’t actually seen the person he was dreaming about. Mason heard the man’s voice and felt his touch, his fangs, but never he didn’t know what an inch of him looked like, apart from his blood red eyes. He just wanted to know who he was dreaming about, for sure.

As the figure bit into his neck and rocked down into him, he pushed at his shoulders. “Stop!”

“What’s wrong Mason? I thought you enjoyed what we share, here in your dreams.” The voice was thick and sweet in his ear.

“I need sleep. Leave me alone.” He groaned watching as the shadowed figure pulled away and stared at him.

“This is your fantasy Mason. I’d do anything you wanted me to do. This is what you wanted.”

He could see that the other man was smirking. “So, you’re just a figment of my imagination?”

“I never said that. It doesn’t matter much anyways, I’ll stop invading your dreams soon.”

Before Mason could be confused, his mom was gently shaking him. The scent of dinner was wafting from downstairs into his nose, instead of his own blood. His mom was smiling at him and he just sighed as she suggested he tell her all about his new friends.

That night, he had a usual dream. He wouldn’t remember most of it when he woke up, except seeing those red eyes in the distance as he held up his sword as he stood on the dragon’s corpse. The eyes winked at him and voice sang around him. “See you tomorrow night Mason.”

His morning was started by listening to Julien and John yell at Vena. They were learning about the werewolf revolution, and the hunters must’ve lost a hell of a lot of men trying to keep the vampire and werewolf fighting away from humans, but it was vampire and werewolf history.

“You’re looking better than you have been.” Fox told him as he walked into algebra.

Mason nodded at him. “Actually got some sleep last night. It was a miracle.”

Without Vena and Julien in their history lesson induced rages, they both also commented on his new liveliness. It was good to know that one sex-dreamless night could make such an improvement to his appearance.

At lunch, Mason saw Julien gathering up blood boxes from the lunch line and people’s hands. Vena snorted with amusement as she ate her fries.

“What’s he doing?”

“The school serves synthetic blood. Julien’s parents, the king and queen, and the majority shareholders in the company that makes it. Not all batches are good.” Fox explained.

“Recreating blood in a form they can store, it’s hard. Sometimes they get it wrong and it could even kill a vampire if they drink it. Even the good batches are dangerous to some vampires. Some get violently ill and some it does about as much for their thirst as water.” Vena shrugged as she ate another fry.

“If it doesn’t work well, why do they even sell it?”

“So your kind doesn’t go to war with ours.” Julien looked exhausted as he sat down. “We need to prove we don’t need to eat humans to survive.”

Mason looked at Vena, who glared at him. He put his hands up in defence as Fox chuckled next to him.

“I put those books in your locker. They were pretty heavy, I figured you wouldn’t want to carry them around all day.” Julien pouted at the soda he had gotten. “Are we still on for Sunday?”

“I can’t. I have to babysit my younger sister.” Fox sighed. Vena rolled her eyes.

“What, Blain can’t watch her? It’s not like he has friends to hang out with.”

“Last time he watched her, Mom came home and found her in the bath. He left her in it for like eight hours or some shit.”

Vena’s eyes filled with horror as she turned to look at where Blain was putting a younger hunter into a headlock. “Tell Alex that he did a really good job turning Blain into him. If you excuse me, I’m going to be sick.” She stood up and grabbed her bag.

Fox stood up and followed her as she stormed out, calling out for her to wait.

“Well, if the hunter isn’t joining us, I was hoping to wear a dress on Sunday.”

“Fine by me.” Mason could his face heating up with a blush as he imagined the well-groomed young man in a dress.

Julien just got up with a large grin covering his face, his fangs showing as he stood up. “Then I will see you Sunday.”

As the vampire walked away, Mason heard what the shadow has said just before he woke up. It sounded almost exactly like Julien.


	4. Chapter 4

Mason rubbed at his eyes as he walked to the park. He didn’t get much sleep as he had stayed up the last two nights reading like a mad man. The amount of information he had absorbed about vampires and hunters (he couldn’t fit all three books into his book bag) was enormous. Both were crazily different from humans in the most unusual ways. He couldn’t wait to stare at Julien in awe and ask him about personal details about the things he learned.

Asking the vampire, probably inappropriate, personal questions was the main reason he hadn’t just texted him and told him that their hang out day was canceled. That and he couldn’t find his phone while his alarm was going off.

He tried shaking off the tired feeling as he walked into the park. There were kids running around, chasing after balls and dogs. His eyes scanned the benches by the walking path, looking for Julien. There was someone sitting with their back to him with an extravagant lace trimmed parasol. As he walked closer, he could see part of the person and they had snow-white hair and piercings enough for the entire park. It was definitely Julien.

 There were two people talking to him, a boy and a girl a little older than he was. Neither of them looked happy to see Julien. As he got closer, he could hear more and more words that the two were spitting at the prince. It was clear that Julien was sitting there, taking it as if they were commenting on the weather.

“You’re disgusting. There are kids here you pervert.” The girl said with an annoyingly high pitched voice. “You look so fugly like that you sicko!”

Julien let a smirk cross his passion pink glossed lips as he trailed his eyes down the man’s body, stopping when they reached his crotch. “I do believe your boyfriend’s dick would disagree.”

Both of them looked down to find the man’s pants tented by an erection. The girl looked disgusted, repeatedly saying the man’s name. The man’s heated up in anger as he pushed the girl away and fisted the other towards Julien. “You wanna go, fag?”

Julien’s grin only grew as he slowly folded his parasol and sat it on the bench. He then stood up and looked up at the taller man. That was when Mason got the first full look at what the vampire was wearing: a pastel pink sun dress with cartoon skulls, knee high sock with bows at the tops, and pale yellow flats. Mason was glad he decided to wear loose jeans, because Vena was right, Julien was very attractive in a dress.

“I don’t think your ego could take being beaten by a man wearing a dress.”

Without another word exchanged, the man punched the vampire square in the jaw. Julien closed his eyes, but barely waivered at the hit. Mason swore and stepped between the two.

“You need your little boyfriend to protect you?”

“Julien can take care of himself.” Mason glared at the man who was about the same height as him, but clearly more muscular.

“He’s protecting you _from me._ ” Julien said from behind the human. The other two humans shrieked and started running in opposite directions.

Mason turned and saw Julien’s eyes fade from a bright red back to their normal purple. Julien smiled at him sweetly. “Thank you.”

“I didn’t do anything.”

“You kept me from ruining my dress.” The vampire picked his parasol back up, positioning it so he had maximum shade. “Come on, it’s scorching out here. Let’s find something inside.”

“Not to mention everyone is staring at us.” Mason followed the vampire with a smile. “You’re really, short, you know that?”

“That is a fiercely guarded royal secret Mason.” Julien turned to pout at him.

The two eventually found themselves at a very pretentious coffee shop near the park. There were rooms to hide away and sit with books scattered around. Julien looked out the window, sipping on his ever proper earl grey. Mason looked down at his latte and then back at the vampire. They’d been sitting in silence for a while.

“So, did you find the books helpful?”

“Uh…” Mason set his cup down and shrugged. “Yeah, but I’m still confused about some stuff.”

“Of course. You’re new to this.” Julien turned to him with a smile. “How can I help clarify things?”

Most of Mason’s questions were mostly inspired by disbelief. He couldn’t believe that vampires could run so fast you couldn’t even see them and that hunter had good enough reflexes to get out of the way. Julien answered most of the questions by nodding and giving him an even more unbelievable fact. Hunters didn’t heal _that_ fast, and vampires needed to be well fed to heal from big wounds, but the fact that they could heal faster than him was crazy. The almost endless list of strengths was mind-blowing for the human.

“The books said that some vampires and hunters have like magic powers. Do you have any powers?” Mason looked at Julien with hopeful eyes.

“I’m the crown prince, of course I do.” Julien smirked at him, knowing that the human wanted to know what these powers were. “And I don’t like using them if I don’t have to. Using them is… draining. If I overused them, I could end up unconscious or dead.”

“Really? Then why can’t you just tell me?”

“I have to keep some secrets, or you’ll become disinterested.” Julien leaned across the table and batted his perfectly lined eyes at him.

Mason could feel his face heating up and he turned away. Silence fell across them again.

“We’re not all powerful. We have weaknesses.” Julien mused after they both finished their drinks. “If we didn’t have any weaknesses, your kind would’ve went extinct centuries ago.”

“Still, with all of your strengths, the weaknesses can’t be that much of an issue, right?” Of course the books had listed the weaknesses alongside all the strengths. Many things made vampires completely powerless: excessive sunlight, hunter weapons, certain kinds of plants, werewolf blood, and holy items.

“I didn’t think crosses really worked.” Mason shrugged as he was cataloging the weaknesses that hunters had. Hunters were very prone to infections and they usually died young from the strain they put on their systems; the biggest weakness hunters had was most of their human system couldn’t withstand their inhuman abilities.

They only work if the person using it believes in it. And any religious symbol would work, as long as it’s being used by a practitioner.”

“So if a wiccan held up a pentagram to you?”

“Against me? Nothing. I’m much too powerful for such a little thing to affect me. But another vampire? It would be exactly like every vampire movie you’ve ever seen.”

Mason nodded as he glanced out the window. It had clouded up some so they could probably go back outside. “So if I get mad at you, I can’t just mace you with holy water.”

“You didn’t say holy water, you said pentagram. Holy water would hurt, a lot.” Julien rolled his eyes at the human, but was smiling. “I can see why Vena was getting annoyed with your questions.”

The human deflated as he took his cup in his hands, despite it being empty. “I-I’m sorry… I can stop…”

“No, no! I just mean, for us, this is just the facts of life. Like you learned to look both ways before you cross the street and don’t talk to strangers, I learnt to avoid sunlight and not to pick wild roses.” Julien reached across the table, wrapping Mason’s hands with his. “You would find it just as tedious trying to explain how easily you could die if you fell in too deep of a puddle.”

“What, you can’t drown?” Mason looked down at the hands on his own. They were surprisingly warm, not warm warm, but not cold like he was expecting.

“Technically, I don’t _have to_ breathe. I can and it helps but I don’t _have to_.” Julien pulled his hands away, scratching his face awkwardly.

“ _What_?” That wasn’t in the book.

“I drink blood and blood usually has oxygen, among its other properties, so I don’t really need to get my own.” Julien shrugged, looking away awkwardly.

“That’s pretty cool. And good to know, if I ever see you not breathing, I shouldn’t panic.”

After sharing a laugh, the two headed back out into the city. Neither of them had a set plan for the day, but Julien wanted to stay out of the sun as much as possible and Mason would love to get lunch at some point. As they walked they talked more about vampire biology and traditions; Julien eventually started asking about human traditions and biology. When Mason acted really offended, he started thinking about his questions more before asking them.

They went to two art museums that happened to be on their path. One was old art, mostly paintings. Julien mocked offense when Mason accused him of having his house decorated exactly like that. The other was weird abstract art that made both of them laugh. Little to either of their notices, they spent most of their time in the museums with their hands connected loosely between them.

Julien spent most of the time Mason ate on him phone. By the huffs and tension in shoulders, it was tedious. As Mason finished shoving pizza in his face, Julien finally put away his phone, apologizing.

“It’s okay, I was way too busy eating anyway. That was the best pizza I ever had.” Mason held the door for him as they left. “Your Highness.”

“Thank you.” Julien winked at him as he opened his parasol. “If you’re going to act like one of my man servants, I might make you carry my parasol.”

“In your dreams.” Mason grinned at him as he moved to walked next to the vampire. “You don’t seem the type to like pizza, why’d you recommend there?”

“My sister swears by it. I’m pretty sure most of that restaurant’s business comes from her.” Julien shrugged.

“You have a sister?”

“Yep, Sira. My dear, eccentric older sister.”

“You’re wearing a dress.”

“And you love it.”

Mason looked away, not saying anything in reply. Julien laughed and bumped his shoulder lightly. “Come on, what do you want to do? I made you go to all those art museums, it’s only fair that you get to choose something.”

The human thought for a while, then he grabbed Julien’s hand, pulling him down the sidewalk. He only stopped as they were entering a book store. “The new installment of my favorite series just came out.”

Julien looked around the store as he followed Mason through the aisles. “Books not bound in human flesh, it’s oddly refreshing.”

Not sure if he was being serious or not, Mason just continued walking to the young adult section. He glance back at the vampire, furrowing his brows. “Do you read a lot?”

“For pleasure? Can’t say I have the time. Most of my reading involves political theory and military tactics. The most contemporarybook I’ve read was _1984_.” Julien shrugged, sounding the most proper he had all day. Mason could never forget than he was with a vampire, but he had almost forgotten that his companion was a prince.

“I had to read that last year for school.” Mason couldn’t stop the frown as he picked up the hard back from the display table.

“If you gave me some recommendations, I’d try to find some time.” Julien smiled at him. Mason beamed and pulled him further into the aisle, throwing books into his arms and explaining the basic story of each as they went. After looking back at Julien, and not being able to see his face from behind the books, he laughed. Then he limited the pile to his three favorites that he thought Julien would really like too.

The two sat in content quietness under the shade of tree in a smaller park than the one they met up in. Each was reading a book, occasionally the two would make a response noise, gaining the other’s attention, but it was mostly quiet. Julien though, kept asking Mason questions about the book he was reading. Mason just grinned at him and told him to keep reading. They stayed like that until the sun began to set.

Mason was startled when Julien stood up. He looked up at the vampire and then looked around, seeing that the streetlights had turned on and the crowds had thinned out severely. The city had never had much of a night crowd, but since the outing of vampires, the few people that did venture out at night were more likely to do it in a car than on the street.

“Come on, we should get you home.” Julien held out his hand to the human with a smile.

“You worried something is going to happen to me while I’m with you?” Mason took his hand gratefully, but was surprised when he had to put no effort into getting up.

“Like you, not everyone recognizes me and I’d like not to have to fight anyone. You saved me from getting blood on my dress once today already.”

They were quiet on their way back to Mason’s. It was a long walk and they were both exhausted from their long day.

“Come on.” Julien said as he crossed at a no-walk light. Mason adamantly waited for the light to change on the other side, watching the vampire almost get hit by van going through the intersection.

The van stopped on the cross walk and Julien heard the side door open on the other side. Then Mason squealing his name. Julien started running around the van to get to him, but the door was already slamming and the van driving away. The vampire easily chased after it, but it ran the next light, getting on an almost completely empty freeway and Julien was blocked by an onslaught of cars.

By the time the Julien could cross, he had to concentrate to try to follow the van. Because of the traffic, he was behind several minutes. Moreover, the day in the sun made it impossible for him to run at full speed. It was unlikely that he’d be able to catch up to the van before it got to its destination.

The destination was apparently an abandoned warehouse on the edge of town. Julien had watched enough movies to know that it wasn’t very original. As he approached the van, he could tell that it was empty. Mason was inside with a few other unconscious humans, almost two dozen conscious humans, and half a dozen vampires.

It was a fight Julien knew he was going to win, but he wasn’t so sure the condition he’d be in once he had. If any of the vampires recognized him, it would make things easier, but he doubted it. The vampires were probably low level vampires, even turned vampires more likely.

“Jesus Marv, what did you do to this kid?” A voice yelled from inside. Julien could tell he was standing close to Mason. He could smell Mason’s blood. “You know the boss don’t like it when you mess ‘em up.”

“He wouldn’t stop moving in the van. It forever for the drugs to kick in.” Another voice.

That was his cue. He moved into the door way into the large room that the men were holding their prizes. Seven humans armed with guns guarding four unconscious kids. He made a noise to let his presence be known with a small sound. “You boys should really learn not to take what’s yours.”

Three of the men pointed their guns at him, while two others laughed at him. One motioned for the others to put their guns down. “You shouldn’t be playing out someplace like this this time of night little girl.”

Julien just grinned, his eyes turning red as he walked towards the man. Before the man could take a step back, he was dead on the floor with a broken neck. “I’m no little girl.”

The other humans started firing at him wildly. He easily dodged all but the first, which lodged itself into his shoulder. His plan of attack had to change when he smelled human blood and glanced over at the unconscious kids and saw the girl bleeding from a bullet meant for him. More people entered the room from the sounds of shooting. These obviously hired thugs weren’t very good shots.

He had to move the fight into the other room where the vampires were still waiting. As he worked his way through the men, plunging his hands straight through the chests and hitting their faces so hard their nose pierced their brains, he heard the people tied up on the ground starting to stir.

If he hadn’t been in the sun all day, he could’ve made quick work of the humans and vampires, but he was weakened enough that he took another bullet, to the leg, and a knife slice to the stomach. He did make it to the other room, but not everyone followed him. Two men stayed behind to pistol whip anyone that decided it was time to wake up from their drug induced sleep.

By the time all but the two guarding their prizes were dead, Julien was certainly worse for the ware. He had a broken nose and two of his piercings had been ripped out. He’d be completely healed by the time authorities came, but his dress was a complete loss.

As he walked into the other room, one of the men was about to hit a completely conscious Mason. Julien threw a knife straight through his head before he could. The other man pointed his gun at Julien.

“If you’re going to fire that, you better make sure it’s going to kill me, otherwise I’m just going to be even more pissed off.”

“Who are you?”

“It doesn’t matter. What matters is that you’re going to tell me who you work for.” Julien walked towards the human, taking his gun once it was in reach.

The man was a stuttering mess. “If I tell you…”

“I’ll make your death quick.” Julien smiled at him. He could hear Mason calling for him from where he was tied up, but he couldn’t be distracted. Mason wasn’t his only concern. As the prince he had to make sure he policed his own ranks to keep things like this from happening.

Once the human said a name, Julien turned the gun on him and shot him point blank in the head.

“Julien!” Mason said again, louder this time. Julien turned towards him, letting the red fade from his eyes as he walked toward the human.

“How hurt are you? Is anything broken?”

“Me? You got shot!” Mason tried flailing, despite being bound. Julien just smiled and took his hands to take off the duct tape.

“They should’ve covered your mouth.”

After Mason’s hands and legs were unbound, Julien was pushing up the sleeve of Mason’s arm. He stared down at the inside of Mason’s elbow. Mason looked at it too, seeing a barely there mark that looked like a heart. Julien then pulled off his blood covered floral wrist band, revealing a stark black mark identical to the one Mason had.

“Remember earlier today when you asked me about marks and bounding, and I brushed you off? This is why.” Julien looked at Mason seriously. The human was just really confused. “I bound us together temporarily to heal you over a week ago and took your memories… the bond if fading and if I don’t heal you, it will likely be gone by tomorrow…”

“And if you heal me now?” Mason could tell the circumstances of their first meeting were something to talk about later. “I’d have those dreams about you longer?”

Julien nodded and Mason nodded back. “Do it, heal me. I don’t want to have to explain this to my mom.”

Mason felt a rush when Julien took his elbow, touching to the two marks together. Then he felt the pain in his face recede the vampire took on all of his injuries. When he felt better, he looked at Julien, frowning. “I didn’t know…”

“I’ll be healed from everything by the time the hunters and our ride gets here.” Julien smiled at him as he stood up and pulled out his phone. “Can you take care of the others while I make a few calls.”


	5. Chapter 5

Mason was sitting in the back of a very new, very expensive car. He looked out the window, seeing Julien talking to two men while other hunters were inspecting and cleaning up the scene. Julien glanced back at him with a small smile and held up a finger, telling him silently that they’d leave in a minute.

When Julien finally was getting into the car beside him, the vampire looked completely drained. “I hate hunters.”

“Sorry…” Mason said quietly as the car started moving.

“It’s not your fault. I should’ve gotten you home way sooner.” Julien made sure the driver was heading in the right direction before he let his head fall back with exhaustion. “Bet you want to know when we met the first time, huh?”

“It’d be nice.”

“It’s not that big of a deal. Felix up there and I were driving to some event, we passed you, lying on the ground with your bike. There were a bunch of people around you, but none of seemed to be the person that hit you. We stopped. I healed you and took you home.” Julien shrugged.

“The Prince is quite the philanthropist.” The older man in the front of the car commented.

“How badly was I hurt?” Mason frowned at Julien.

“If you would’ve laid there until the ambulance got there, you wouldn’t be sitting here now.”

“You saved my life. Why? You didn’t know me, you didn’t have to.”

“What was I gaining if you died? And what would I lose if I saved you? There was no reason not to save you. I could take your injuries, and I could heal from them easily.”

“Why don’t I remember?”

“You were unconscious when I got there, and I thought your life would be easier if you just went about your life… so I made sure you stayed that way until you got home.” Julien yawned and looked out the window. “Miraculously your bike didn’t have a scratch on it.”

“You bought me a new one.” Mason said in a flat tone. “I thought it looked different.”

“I admit to nothing of the sort.”

“Thank you, for then and for saving me tonight.” Mason said after several minutes of silence.

“It’s not a problem. I’ll save you again if I need to.”

“So, about the dreams…” Julien groaned at Mason bringing that up. “Was that you, like actually you?”

“No. It did what I would do, in the situations you wanted, but it wasn’t me controlling your dreams. Whatever situations we were in, you wanted.”

Mason turned away as he blushed. “I never saw your face before, I guess because I didn’t know about you or the bond…”

“You should see it now.”

“Do you have dreams, about me?”

“Because of the bond? I’ve had a few.” Julien gave him a sly smile, that made Mason uncomfortable about the range of sexy and cute the vampire could manage.

“What were they about?”

“We sat and talked a lot. I don’t remember most of the specifics of our conversations… I guess I just needed someone to talk to.”

Mason’s face was getting redder, so he turned away again. “Well, you can talk to me in waking hours too.”

“I know, thank you for that.”

They were quiet for the rest of the ride, Julien smiled at Mason as he got out of the car. “Hey, Mason…”

“Yeah?” Mason paused and looked back at the other boy.

“Don’t tell Vena, about the bond. I’d like for her not to kill me.”

Laughing, Mason agreed and waved. The car stayed out front until he was safely inside.

As Mason walked into his house, he heard his mom in the living room, watching some terrible late night drama. He groaned, knowing that he’d have to go through living room to get up to his room and get a shower. As least he wasn’t injured, anymore.

His mom freaked out when she saw him, following him upstairs, yelling and demanding to know what happened.

“I go to a school with vampires and werewolves, you’re lucky I don’t come home from school looking like this.” Mason grinned at her as he shut the door to his room in her face. That didn’t really help rest her mind.

 

His dream, his very good dream, was interrupted by his phone ringing. He groaned and looked over where it was sitting across the room. As he maneuvered to reach it without actually getting out of bed, he groaned again.

“Morning Vena.” He said with a yawn.

“I don’t know if hanging out today is a good idea. I sort of had a rough weekend.” She sounded like she had just stopped crying.

“I know the feeling, but we wouldn’t have to do anything. I could come over, and we could watch terrible movies and order Chinese food for lunch.” He sat up and glanced down first at his boner and then at the mark on his arm. It was too hot to have to wear long sleeves, but he told Julien he wouldn’t tell Vena about the bond.

There was silence on the other end for a long time before Vena sighed. “My apartment’s a mess. I sort of had a bit of an episode yesterday.”

“Then I’ll help you clean it up. Text me your address.”

More silence before there was a small groan. “Alright. Thank you Mason.”

“Anytime.” He hung up with her to get dressed, hearing his phone dig with the text. On his way out, he grabbed the granola bar his mom left out for him. He’d never skipped school before, he felt dangerous.

He felt less dangerous after his extremely long bike ride into town. She lived way downtown, just outside of where rent was insane. Her building was the only one on her block that didn’t have a doorman.

Before he could knock on her apartment door, the door opened. Vena looked rough. He forced himself to smile at her. “I brought some movies and my notebooks on vampires and hunters.”

Rolling her eyes at him, she moved so he could enter the room. “You didn’t ask Julien enough questions yesterday?”

“I was a little distracted. You’re so right, he’s very pretty in a dress.” He looked around, seeing broken glass from vases and picture frames. There were piles of ripped up paper. It wasn’t that bad, but it was obvious she had a tantrum recently. “Where’s your vacuum?”

She rolled her eyes again and opened the door next to the front door. He glanced inside, seeing a broom and vacuum cleaner. “I actually cleaned the entire apartment on Saturday, but…”

“Di-…” He stopped himself as he remembered why they were skipping school. Sunday had been the anniversary of Peirce killing the monster that had turned Vena. “Where’s Peirce?”

“No idea. I haven’t seen him since he dropped me off at school Friday morning.” She shrugged, trying to hide her feelings. Mason could tell she was pissed, but how pissed was hard to tell since she was hiding her feelings.

Mason didn’t know Peirce, but the little bit he saw that one day in the office made him think he wouldn’t purposely leave her alone on such an important day. Maybe he was wrong about the man. Without saying anything else, he handed her the vacuum while he took the dustpan and broom. She raised an eyebrow at him. “You really think you should be picking up glass?”

“Are you going to eat me if I accidently cut myself?” He grinned at her. Vena looked shocked for a split second before she smiled back at him.

“Don’t say I didn’t warn you.” She walked over to the small kitchen to grab a bag for the paper and big pieces of glass.

As they cleaned up the living room, they were quiet, Vena picking up paper as Mason swept up glass. She was going to do the entire room with the vacuum when he was done. He swore as he did the inevitable. His eyes went to where Vena had stopped what she was doing, suddenly very tense.

“Bandages are in the bathroom, through my room.” She very slightly nodded towards the correct door. He took a deep breath and walked through her room, not stopping to take in how she had it decorate. Bandages were on the counter of her very spacious bathroom. It was obvious how much use they got, by the sheer number and variances she had. Once he had it cleaned up and covered, he walked back into her room.

Her room was big. Like huge. It was bigger than his mom’s room at his house. There was a bay window that lead out to the fire escape. He imagined her sitting out on it at night, staring at the sky and questioning her life. She had a huge bed with dark grey sheets. It was weirdly odd to see that there were stuffed animals of all sorts lined up on one side. There wasn’t much else on the walls. A few generic posters and pictures. Some photos were on her dresser, but he didn’t take a closer look, because privacy. Her walls were painted pink, which didn’t seem like a color she would enjoy.

“Peirce decorated it when I moved in with him.” He jumped and looked over to see her standing in the doorway. “I’ve changed some stuff, but I don’t care enough to completely redo it.”

“It’s nice…” He bit his lip, trying to sell it and knowing he failed.

“For a normal fifteen year old it would’ve been fine. I might redo it soon though, I’m not a teenager anymore.”

“How old are you?”

“Twenty. I’ll be twenty-one in two months.” She shrugged. He stared at her, trying to process that. Vena didn’t look a day over sixteen. “When you get turned into a vampire, you stop aging.”

“Then why are you still in school?”

“For three years I didn’t go at all. Last year I tried, and missed so much that it didn’t actually count.” She blew a breath out of her nose. “It’s hard… going to school and dealing with my problems.”

“Then why don’t you just drop out, get a GED?” He tilted his head, remembering the headmistress mentioning that something would happen to her if she stopped attending school.

She looked away. “I’d sooner die than… It doesn’t matter, as long as I’m in school, it shows that I’m trying.”

“We should finish up…”

“I did, while you were taking care of your finger.” She smiled at him. “What movies did you bring over?”

He smiled back at her, listing off what he brought. She laughed at most of the titles, since he somehow managed to grab all the vampire movies he owned. Vena picked the only one that didn’t have blood sucking monsters and set up the TV as he rummaged through his book bag.

They had barely made it to the half way point of the movie, the two of them were having a good time, when Vena stood up from the couch and stared at the front door. Mason looked at her and heard keys in the lock. Peirce must’ve been home.

When the door open, Peirce looked rather disheveled and pretty hung over. He was grinning as his eyes trained on Vena, but the grin fell as he stared at her. “What?”

“Where were you this weekend?” Vena’s voice was shaky as she spoke, but Mason wasn’t sure if she was holding back tears or shouts.

“Ou-…” The man paused and his eyes went wide as he looked around the room, falling on a hole in the wall the two couldn’t fix. “I’m sorry.”

“Sorry doesn’t fix that I was here alone, to deal with it on my own!” Apparently she was holding back both shouting and crying. Tears were streaming down her cheeks as she dug her nails into her hands so hard blood was dripping onto the floor.

“Vena…” Peirce started moving around the couch, closer to her. She took a few steps away from him, shaking her hand.

“What else was so important that you forgot the date?!”

“Nothing. Nothing is more important to me than you, you know that.” He reached out to her, a soft smile falling onto his lips. She smacked away his hand and turned, running out the still open front door. Mason watched her go as Peirce yelled for her a few times.

“Do you want me to go after her?” Mason looked up at the man, who was on the verge of tears himself. Peirce looked shocked, like he hadn’t noticed that he was sitting there.

“I can’t go after her and she shouldn’t be out there on her own, not when she’s like that.” Peirce sounded like that he wasn’t too fond of someone else going after her though. “I fucked up.”

“I’ll talk to her.”

Mason found her sitting around the back of the building, in the small grass area for kids and pets. She curled up in a ball against the brick wall, not looking up at him as he approached.

“Vena?” He said it softly so he wouldn’t startle her. “Can I sit with you?” She didn’t respond, but he took her silence as a yes.

The two of them sat in silence for a while, before Vena finally looked at him. Her eyes were a bright red and her fangs were more obvious than usual. “You shouldn’t’ve sat so close Mason.”

He smiled at her. “I’m not scared. I trust you, we’re friends after all.”

“Just because we’re friends, it doesn’t change what I am.” Her eyes fell to his neck and she closed them tightly.

“You’re a girl with a terrible past and in desperate need of more friends. From what I’ve seen, vampires aren’t _that much_ different than humans.”

“You haven’t seen a whole lot.”

“Julien and my outing yesterday ended in him slaughtering a dozen human traffickers, and he still didn’t seem any different.”

“He’s not much of a vampire to begin with.” She didn’t seem too surprised that the prince had killed a bunch of people randomly.

Mason bumped his shoulder into hers as he chuckled. “I guess not. How bad is it?”

She shook her head. “It’s not a feeling you could understand. People call it hunger or thirst, but it’s so much more painful, more insistent.”

“If I stick around vampires long enough, I’ll probably get pretty familiar with it.” Vena raised an unimpressed eyebrow at him and he cleared his throat. “If you need blood, you should go back upstairs. Peirce definitely feels bad about it and you can’t sit down here brooding forever.”

“You’re terrible at this, you know that?” She smiled at him. He scratched his cheek and looked away. “But you’re also right. Peirce wasn’t there when I needed him yesterday, but he’s been there before and he’s here now. I’m not going to forgive him so easily, but…”

Mason stood up first, offering her his hand to help her to her feet. Her hand was gripping his hard, as if he was her lifeline, even after she was standing. He could feel the blood on her hands, still flowing from the small wounds. “You okay?”

Moved a little closer to him, her breathing heavy. Her face was going towards his neck, making him tense. “Vena?” She stopped moving, her forehead falling to his shoulder.

“Sorry.”

“Don’t be, I trust you. If you ever really need it, all you need to do is ask.” He squeezed her hands before dropping one. “Come on, let’s go back inside.”

She nodded and let her lead him inside. Once they were inside, they didn’t see Peirce.

“He’s in his room. You should go, thank you. For everything.” She smiled at him as she let his hand go.

Nodding, he gathered up him stuff. “I’ll see you at school tomorrow?”

She smiled at him, but didn’t say anything. Mason had a sneaking feeling that he wouldn’t.

Once Mason was gone, Vena opened the door to Peirce’s room. He instantly got up, walked over to her, antiseptic, and bandages in hand. Vena glanced down at her still bleeding hands as he took one and poured the stinging liquid on it. She swore at the feeling.

“Vampires don’t get infections.” She whimpered as he dried it off gently.

“I don’t like taking chances with you, since you’re so different than other vampires.” Peirce smiled at her. “Are you going to bite me without me having to force you?”

“It’s punishment.” She winced as he cleaned off her other hand.

“I really am sorry, the date slipped my mind completely.” He finished with her hands and brushed her cheek with his knuckles. “You know I would never leave you like that on purpose.”

“It doesn’t change that you weren’t here.” She was staring at his neck, her hands shaking on either side of her.

“Come on, I completely accept my punishment, and you need the blood.” Peirce took another step towards her. She brought one of her hands to his shoulder, pulling him closer so she could reach his neck. Without any other warning, she pierced his neck with his fangs. He groaned, wrapping her in his arms as he soothed her back.

Once she was finished, she pulled back and wiped her mouth. “I’m still mad at you.”

Chuckling, he kissed her forehead. “I wouldn’t have it any other way. You can go ahead and shower first, I’ll braid your hair when I’m done mine.”

“You smell like sex, you should get your shower first.” She smiled, wrinkling her nose at him.


	6. Chapter 6

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Short chapter, but important chapter.

Fox grinned at him like a madman when he walked into school. “So, tell me all about both of your dates this weekend.”

“They weren’t dates?” Mason said quietly, not really sure how Julien or Vena felt. He doubted that Vena felt like it was a date, but Julien was a wild card.

“Whatever they were, how was hanging out with those two enigmas outside of school?”

“Look who’s calling me an enigma.” Vena stepped beside them, glaring at Fox. “Do you own a mirror?”

Mason beamed at her. “I’m glad you decided to come today.”

“I told you I would.” She gave him a small smile in return. “Besides, I’m still mad at Peirce, why would I want to hang out with him all day?”

“Maybe because he’s in love with you and would literally kill literally anything if it would make you happy?” Fox raised an eyebrow at her and she returned the look with a glare.

If Vena gave Mason the look she was giving the hunter, the human would be dead. “He sure has a funny way of showing it.”

Nodding, he pointed in the direction of his own class and left without saying bye.

Mason smiled at her. “Spending time with him can’t be that bad?”

She gave him a pained look as she entered their history class. He was going to press further, but he was distracted by the vampire prince that stared at him the second he walked in the door. Vena snorted next to him and went to her seat.

“Good morning.” Julien cooed as Mason sat down. “How was your day with Vena yesterday?”

“Interesting.” He smiled back at the vampire, hoping his face wasn’t as red as he thought it was. “We just hung out for a while.”

“Sounds boring, but maybe Vena’s a more interesting person than I give her credit her for.” He smiled at him and Mason saw her roll her eyes.

Before Mason could answer their teacher came in and started class. Julien and him didn’t have much time during English either.

As Julien and Mason walked to lunch, the vampire stopped and grabbed the human. Mason stared at him. “What?”

“Come on, let’s go around the other way.” Julien looked paler than usual, pale and green as if he was about to be sick.

“But that way is always more crowded.” Mason rolled his eyes, wondering what had the prince so spooked. He brushed off the vampire’s hand and pressed forward.

“Wait.” Julien called, taking a few steps towards him. As he did, two girls walked past them, looking absolutely mortified.

“Ugh, they can’t at least take her into a class room or something when they do that shit?” One groaned.

“What a slut, letting anyone do what they want to her?” The other replied before they walked out of Mason’s ear shot. He turned and followed them with his eyes before glaring at Julien.

“I didn’t want you to see her like that.” He looked away in shame.

“Maybe someone should start trying to stop it.” Mason said decisively as dropped his books and ran in the direction of a commotion of whistling and shouting.

He broke through the crowd circled around a set of lockers. Mason could hear people shouting, at least two people at Vena, but he blocked out their words as he locked his eyes onto Vena. She was pressed against the locker by two vampire boys, her skirt hiked up and her panties on the floor. It looked like her shirt was ripped open.

“Stop it.” Mason yelled, his fists balling at his sides.

The hallway went silent. One of the boys stayed with Vena, laughing in her ear. The other walked toward Mason, rolling up his sleeves. “Are you going to make me, human?”

“If I have to.” He glared at the vampire, despite the boy’s eyes being bright red.

Both the boys laughed again. “You and what army? It might be against the rules to hurt you, but I could restrain you easily.”

Before Mason could come up with a good reply, Julien pushed through the crowd. “You touch him, and it will be the last thing you do on this earth Cozma.”

The lower vampire bowed his head and took a step back. “Your highness… I…”

“You’re going to have Boroi get off Cava, and then to two of you are going to meet my chauffer outside. He’s going to take you to the palace, where you will wait in the dungeons for your fate.”

Mason turned to look at Julien. He looked even more threatening than the night he killed two dozen people, it was probably the wardrobe change. His eyes were bright red and he looked furious, like a real movie-esqu night terror.

The two vampires scrambled to get their shit together, the one who had been closest to Vena, zipping up his pants. As they ran out, the crowd parting for them, Mason walked over to Vena who was still against the lockers, disheveled and shaking.

Julien made a blanket statement to the crowd. “Mason is under my protection. Anyone under his protection is therefor also protected by my authority, and my fangs.”

The crowd effectively scrambled after that.

“Hey, Vena, they’re gone. Come on, let’s get you cleaned up.” Mason reached out to touch her shoulder gently, attempting a smile.

She opened her eyes and just stared at him. She flinched when Julien bent down to pull up her panties and fix her skirt.

“I’m offended Vena, you know very well I have no interest in you.” Julien rolled his eyes.

Vena sent the prince a quick glare before wrapping her arms around Mason’s shoulders and burying her face into his shoulder. “Thank you Mason.”

Mason flinched at the sudden hug, but smiled and wrapped her arms gently around her waist. “Come on, let’s go get you cleaned up.”

Julien started walking down the empty hall. “I’ll escort you to the nurse’s office, but then I’m going to talk to the headmistress.”

Gently, Mason pulled Vena with him as he followed Julien. Julien stood outside and stared at the two of them. “I’ll be back to check on you afterwards, Vena.”

She gave him a strange look before detaching from Mason and opening the door. Mason waved at him before following her inside the nurse’s office.

Like the rest of the school, it was nicer than Mason’s old school. It was smaller though, probably because when vamps and werewolves got hurt, it would just heal right away. A woman was lying on one of the two cots and Mason assumed she was the nurse.

“Again?” The woman said as she sat up. Once she was sitting up, she stared at Mason.

Vena looked back at him too and sighed. “This is Mason… he actually… stopped it.”

“Really?” The nurse looked impressed as she walked over to him. “You’re a very brave young human.”

“I had a little help from Julien Cardia.” Mason shrugged, feeling a little embarrassed.

Vena sighed. “You should head back to class, I’ll be okay.”

“Are you sure? It’s just lunch, I don’t mind skipping to make sure…”

“Please? I’ll see you later.”

He wanted to protest more, but he finally caved in and headed to lunch, which was mostly over. As soon as he sat down at the table with Fox, he was asked a series of questions of why he would do what he did. He blinked at them and then looked at Fox.

“The real question is why haven’t any of you done anything before today? It doesn’t matter what she is, or what’s been done to her before, no one deserves to be treated like that.” Mason gritted out, ending the questions. Fox next to him didn’t speak at all through lunch and didn’t even say bye when they parted ways before class.

Vena had just finished getting dressed when Julien walked into the nurse’s office. His face looked grim as she turned to look at him. “You want him.”

He took a deep breath as he stopped. “I wouldn’t phrase it like that, it makes me seem like... like I want to use him.”

She raised her eyebrows at him as she pulled on her jacket. “Then what do you want from him?”

Julien’s face turned red as he turned away. “I don’t really see what this has to do with you.”

“If he wishes to protect me, then I will protect him, even from you.” She walked past him, towards the door.

“I don’t want to hurt him Vena.”

“This is why you promised to protect me, because it’s what he wants. Thank you, by the way, even if you didn’t do it for me.”

“I never condoned what they did to you.”

“I’ll see you in class, your highness.”

“We’re going to the same class!” Julien called to her as she walked out into the hallway. He groaned when she was gone and rushed to follow her.

As they packed up after ethics, Vena stood and looked like she was waiting next to Mason’s desk. He glanced up at her. “You okay?”

She hummed and looked even more impatient. “Fine. Just waiting for you.”

“For?”

“I’m going home with you?”

Mason frowned, not because he didn’t want her to, but because he’d been subject to constant questioning of if he was sleeping with Vena, or Julien. Taking her home would only make it worse. “Yeah, there’s not really much to do at my house.”

“I figured I could help you study for this class, and history.”

“You can’t avoid Peirce forever, Vena.” Fox said, looking at her with a sad expression.

“He’s working. I just don’t want to be in the apartment alone. Can you blame me for that, Fox?”

Without saying a word, he got up and left. From the hallway, Mason heard Blain call to him. Fox replied with a very loud “go fuck yourself.”

“What’s wrong with Fox? He wasn’t himself at lunch either.” Mason looked at Vena who seemed spaced out in the direction of the door. “Vena?”

She looked at him and sighed. “He just regrets not doing what you did today… I’ll talk to him about it tomorrow.”

“What are you going to tell him? I mean…”

“It’s not entirely his fault, he was brainwashed by people he trusted.” She then smiled at him. “But it’s something for him and I to discuss, let’s get going. You have a lot of studying to do for those tests later this week.”

Groaning, he followed her out of the classroom.


	7. Chapter 7

Vena was there until after night fall and she was looking out the front window into the darkness as she called Peirce for the third time. She groaned and shoved her phone in her pocket. “He has to be home. He’s just probably asleep. He’s so useless…”

“If you wait, my mom could probably take you home.”

“I should’ve left sooner… thanks though. I’ll just walk.”

“I’m not going to let you walk alone!”

“I can take care of myself Mason.”

“It didn’t look that way today.”

She didn’t answer as she started putting her stuff back in her bookbag.

“How come you never fight back… do you think you deserve it?” Mason moved closer to her as he looked around for his coat and house keys.

“It’s not that… it’s just I know that too many feel like they can use me that my fighting back would only make it worse. The only way they’d stop is if someone else stood up for me, and it’s going to take them a while to understand just that you and Julien are serious.”

“I’m dead serious. I’m not going to let those jerks hurt you.” He smiled at her and she rolled her eyes.

“You’re lucky someone’s willing to keep those jerks from killing you.”

Mason feigned hurt as he opened the put on his coat. She smiled at him and opened the door.

Most of the walk to Vena’s was pretty quiet, occasionally they bumped each other’s shoulders, but they didn’t say much. Though, Vena did promise not to let him get kidnapped by any human traffickers. Mason glared at her for a few blocks, trying to explain that Julien _saved him_ thank you very much.

They were in the same neighborhood as Vena’s building when something happened. Vena stopped and turned. They were in a pretty well-lit area, but there were several dark alleys off the street. “Did you hear that?”

“You mean the far away thing that normal humans can’t hear?” Mason crossed his arms at her.

She sent him a quick glare. “It sounds like a little kid crying…” Then she started speeding walking in the direction that Mason assumed the sound was coming from.

They were half way down a dark alley when Mason’s eyes adjusted enough to see a young girl, probably about five or six years old sitting next to a dumpster. She was definitely crying and she looked like she had fallen. Vena covering her mouth and nose with her arm was a pretty good indication that the little girl was bleeding.

“You okay?” Mason asked her with a smile, kneeling down to look at her better. She looked surprisingly like Vena. Her hair was black or dark brown and her skin was significantly lighter than Vena’s, but her face was very much a younger version Vena’s.

“I’m scared. I just wanted to see big brother.” She wiped her eyes and sniffed a few times. Her speech was typical of someone her age, a little slurred and some sounds being completely wrong, but understandable. “I got lost and I fell… what if the vampires can smell my blood?”

Mason glanced at Vena, who looked very concentrated. She was probably trying to keep her eyes from turning red. “Well, we’re here now, so we won’t let anyone hurt you.”

“What’s your name?” Vena’s voice was surprisingly sweet.

“Jenny Sharpe.” She sobbed a few times. Vena and Mason looked at each in slow motion.

“Is your big brother Blaine? Or maybe Fox?” Vena asked, still looking at the human.

Jenny nodded. “Mommy and Daddy said Blaine was being tested tonight and I didn’t get to wish him luck! How do you know big brother?”

“Call Fox. Now.” Vena said quietly to Mason before telling Jenny that her and Mason went to school with both of her brothers.

Mason stood up and dialed Fox’s number.

“Now’s not really a go-…”

“I found your sister.” Mason interrupted his friend. “I’m with her and Vena at the corner of…” He took a few steps outside the alley to find street signs. Once he listed off the street signs, he headed back to the girls.

“Thanks so much man, I was so worried.” He then repeated what Mason said to someone else. “That’s really close to Peirce’s place, why don’t we just meet you guys there?”

“Sounds like a plan. She’s hurt anyway so we should clean her up.”

When he made it back to the girls, Vena was standing and looking guarded. Jenny was cowering behind her leg. He dropped his phone when he saw what Vena was staring at several feet down the dark alley. Two pairs of dark red eyes.

“Could we out run them?” Mason whispered to Vena, bending down to pick up Jenny.

“Me? Maybe. You? No.” Vena took a deep breath. “Whatever happens, you protect her, got it?”

“Yeah… Can you…?”

“Whatever else I am, I’m a hunter.”

Mason looked back up and one of the pairs of eyes was missing and Jenny was screaming in his arms, pointing behind him. They were cornered now. “How’d it get behind us?”

“Just worry about keeping her safe.” Vena said as she took a few steps forward and did a backflip over him and Jenny. He turned to watch her land a kick in the face of the vampire behind them.

He was too stunned at the move to notice the closeness of heavy breathing for a few seconds. Without thinking, he reacted to Vena’s yelling “DUCK!” by getting low and running over to the dumpsters. He sat Jenny down between two and looked around. With an accomplished smile, he picked up a trashcan lid he hoped would be a good deterrent if he hit the vampires hard enough with it.

Watching Vena fight was a lot more exciting than watching Julien fight. The vampire prince just took hits and ripped out throats. Vena actually had to fight off the attacking vampires, she also had to keep moving to keep one from sneaking off to grab Mason and Jenny while she was busy.

She must’ve been tiring out quickly. The vampires had taken a large chunk out of her arm and she was cut on her stomach, so she was losing blood. She also told him that she still had her high metabolism so she burned through blood way quicker than the average vampire. He had also learned about how different species’ blood affected vampires. Hunter blood was the least effective at curbing hunger so Peirce’s blood didn’t help her much to begin with. This fight would be over soon if the fight kept up with the same intensity.

The fight seemed to be droning on and Vena had lost a lot of blood. Mason was bruised and scratched from being a human shield until Vena found a few moment to pull the vampire off him. If only there were two of Vena.

“Vena!” He yelled as she fell to one knee near a pool of her own blood. She was breathing heavily and holding her neck where one had taken a chunk out. One vampire was hovering over her and laughing and the other was walking slowly towards Jenny and Mason.

Vena looked up at him and then at pool of dark liquid. The liquid started shaking, rippling and pulling up from the center. Once is was pulled up suddenly it started taking form, a clone of Vena. Mason made a note to be impressed when his life was in danger.

He was also distracted by the sound of more people coming, which drew the vampire not attacking Vena’s attention away from him and Jenny. He really hoped it was Fox and that the hunter was heavily armed.

What he saw come into the light of the alley wasn’t Fox, but a giant tan wolf. The wolf was snarling, catching attention from the second vampire long enough for Vena’s clone to reach out and ripe out its heart, it falling into a pile of dust. The wolf immediately went for the throat of the other, turning it to dust too. Fox followed behind the wolf, panting slightly. His eyes fell to the two Venas, both of which were staring at him.

“I’m a much more efficient hunter when I have weapons.” The original said with a huff.

“I can’t believe you lost enough blood for to make a clone…” Fox was staring at the completely uninjured version of her. “So should I…?”

The injured Vena stood up, visibly shaking as the clone fell back into a puddle of blood. Yelping slightly, the wolf ran over to the vampire and caught her as she fell forward. Vena let herself lean on the wolf, running one of her hands through the fur. “Thanks Claudette.”

“Fox!” Jenny yelled from behind the human, wiggling her way between Mason and the dumpster. Fox scooped her up and hugged her tightly.

“Never do that again.” He said softly, soothing his fingers through her hair. “You scared me so much.”

“I’m sorry…”

Mason finally set down his trashcan lid and walked over to Vena. “You need some help?”

“Claudette’s got me. I just need some rest.”

Claudette huffed at that, obviously wishing she could make a smart comment.

“Oh shut up, I’m going to give you spare clothes when we get to my place, unless you’d rather go across the city naked?” Vena glared at the wolf.

“Come on, let’s just get to Vena’s place, Jenny and I both have cuts that need patched up.” Mason sighed, hoping that he wasn’t actually going to almost die every time he went out with his new friends.

Luckily, there was no one around to stare at the group covered in blood and containing a werewolf in full shift. The one person they passed in the lobby of Vena’s building didn’t even look surprised as she stared at the group of supernatural teenagers.

When Fox opened the door to Vena’s apartment, two people looked at them from the sofa. Pierce gave an exasperated sigh. His female companion screamed, so high of a scream that poor Claudette lowered her ears as she whimpered.

Pierce reached for the woman as Vena rolled her eyes and stood up. She didn’t say anything as she started limping towards her room.

“Vena, this is…”

“I really don’t care about the name of your latest conquest Pierce, just get her out of here.” Vena slammed open her door open and clumsily making it to her bathroom. Mason started to follow her when Pierce stood and made his way into Vena’s room. Promptly there was a lot of yelling from Vena and quite a bit of apologizing from Pierce.

As the woman tried to worm her way out of the apartment through the three that were still in the doorway, Fox shook his younger sister slightly, who yawned liked she had fallen asleep on the walk.

“I’m going to go clean her up in Pierce’s bathroom. Maybe you should change back and try to find something to wear, Claudette?” Fox gave the wolf a look, the wolf seemed to smirk at him.

Mason closed the front door and looked over himself to actually check his wounds now that he was in good lighting. They weren’t as bad as he thought. Most of the cuts were superficial, but he did lose some blood over it.

He looked up and watched Claudette walk into Vena’s room and close the door with her back paw. Through the door he heard an awful crunching sound that he assumed was her changing back into a human form. As he wondered if it hurt as much as it sounded like it did, he went through Peirce’s room to find Fox and Jenny.

Fox had Jenny on the counter and just finished bandaging her up. She wasn’t too hurt, mostly from her fall from before him and Vena had found her. The hunter looked at Mason when he walked in and smiled at him. “Seriously, thanks for finding her.”

“It’s not like we were looking for her, besides, you should thank Vena. If it was just me, Jenny and I would both probably be dead.” Mason looked at the little girl who was pouting at the regular tan bandage. “How are you doing?”

“Vampires are scary.” She looked up at him.

Mason smiled and patted her head. “Those vampires definitely were, but not all of them are like that.”

She looked confused by that concept, but Fox just sighed. “How about you go see if there’s anything on the TV? I’ll ask Peirce if he can take us home when he’s done helping Vena with her wounds.”

Once she was gone, Fox all but collapsed. Mason snorted. “You’re so melodramatic. You didn’t even do anything.”

Fox gave him a sideways glare as Claudette walked into the bathroom. She wasn’t what Mason was expecting. Her jaw was very sharp, and familiar with obviously dyed, short blonde hair, a single blue streak in the bangs, and light green eyes. She looked almost exactly like the werewolf that Vena and Julien argued with during history. The clothes she borrowed from Vena made it obvious how flat her chest was.

“He’s just worried about his sister.” Claudette said in a surprisingly high-pitched voice.

“Jenny’s fine, just a little scared and banged up?” Mason was just as confused by that as by the werewolf’s strange appearance.

“His older sister?” Claudette looked like she didn’t understand what Mason didn’t understand.

Mason looked at Fox for an explanation, but Fox just looked away.

“Nobody told him that Vena’s your big sister?”

Mason couldn’t even respond, just stare dumbfounded at the two of them.

“It sort of never came up?” Fox frowned as he looked at Claudette. “Anyway, it’s going to be fine, she’s going to be fine. He’s not going to do anything to her.”

“I would like to remind you that my mother isn’t entirely convinced your step-father didn’t murder your dad for his position.”

“Your mother is a pretty good judge of character.” Fox mused just as Mason regained his composure.

“So, Vena’s your older sister… and Blain?”

“The middle child. At least until Alex Sharpe removed Vena from the picture and had his own daughter.” Claudette moved her bangs out of her eyes and smiled. “But that’s something for Fox and Vena deal with, I don’t think we’ve been properly introduced.”

“I am Mason Ramos. Do you go to the school?”

“I do, but I’ve been out because of…” She motioned to herself. “I just started treatment for all of this and it’s been making me a touch on the sick side. I’m Claudette Ethans, you may have met my twin brother.”

“I thought you looked familiar.” Mason grinner at her. “Will you be starting again soon? School’s such a drag with just Fox around.”

She grinned and opened her mouth to reply, but Mason’s phone started ringing. He looked at it and Fox grimaced. “Your mom?”

“Julien…” He answered it and was instantly bombarded by urgent questions and it almost sounded like the vampire was in tears. “Hey, hey calm down… you okay?”

Claudette was whispering to Fox about which Julien Mason was talking about, Fox looking defensive as he avoided answering.

“Are _you_ okay?” Julien countered, sniffing. “I-I felt…”

“Oh, I’m fine, I promise. Just a couple of scratches, a few bruises.” Mason sighed and moved into the other room. “Vena took most of the beating.”

Sighing happily, he took a few breaths to calm himself. “I was so nervous… I was in a meeting with my dad and some lords so I couldn’t just…”

Mason felt his face heating up. “You wanted to protect me… I have a few other friends that can do that while you’re busy.”

“Good… I need to get back to the meeting though… I’ll see you tomorrow at school.”

“See you…” Mason looked up to see Peirce walk in. “How’s Vena?”

“She’s… rough… but she’ll heal.” Peirce sighed and glanced into his bathroom. “You want to round up the rest of the hoodrats, so I can drive you all home?”

“We’re not hoodrats you old drunk!” Claudette called from the bathroom.

“I’m only 25 and you’re getting dropped off first.” Peirce then walked out, mumbling about shedding on his carpet.

 

 


	8. Chapter 8

Mason was the last one Peirce dropped off. When the human started getting out of the car, he felt the older male’s hand on his shoulder and paused.

“Hey kid, hopefully next time we see each other, it’ll be under better circumstances.”

Nodding, Mason frowned at him. “She really depends on you… you should try being more dependable.”

Peirce blew a breath out of his nose. “Yeah. I know, I know. Even after the five years she’s been with me, it’s hard. A lot of things about living with Vena are hard.”

“You mean the fact that you’re in love with her?”

The man tried to fiercely deny it, but under the teenager’s gaze, he eventually nodded. “It’s a terrible thing, being in love with someone that’s right there, but you can’t ever have. I can control myself, but sometimes I have to get away, or I’ll burst. I’d hate to do something stupid, and hurt her.”

“You do that anyway. I don’t think she likes it when you sleep around.” Mason raised his eyebrows at him. He felt like he was a parent lecturing their child. It was weird feeling.

“I know…” He rubbed his neck. “You should get inside, before your folks worry about you.”

“See you around Peirce.”

When he walked into school the next day, Julien immediately held his shoulders and looked over him. Fox snorted as he walked over. “He’s fine, your royal fussiness.”

Julien ignored him as he moved one of his hands to Mason’s face. “You really okay?”

“Yeah. I’m just a little scratched up. You should see Vena.”

“I told him about Vena. He sent his driver home to get her something.” Fox pushed Julien slightly. “He’s really a big softie.”

“What did you get for her?” Mason frowned. He didn’t see her drink any fake blood and he figured blood would be the only thing that would help.

Julien just grinned and looked at the entrance. “It was given freely by a volunteer, and it’s fresh.”

“She’s going to punch you.” Mason smiled back at him, but followed his gaze to see Vena walk in. He was almost surprised she had decided to come after what happened. He called for her and she looked hesitant as she walked over to the three guys.

“You stay a good arm’s length away from me.” Vena pointed at the human before glaring at Julien.

“Why are you looking at me suspiciously?’ The prince couldn’t help but grin before taking a thermos from Fox to hold out to her. “This is for you.”

She raised her eyebrows at him. He pushed it closer to her. Finally, she took the thermos and walked away. Mason and Fox both watched her leave before looking back at the prince. Julien shrugged and mentioned that it was probably time to head to class.

When Vena walked into history, late, she looked much better than she did when she walked into school. She smiled at Mason and glared at Julien, who whispered “Your welcome” at her while the teacher lectured her about timeliness.

Claudette walked into their math class, pausing heavily as she watched Julien and Mason talking. Mason looked over at her and smiled. She grumbled something as she walked over to them.

“Hello, good to see you’re feeling better.” Julien smiled at her. “I hear you and Mason met last night.”

She looked different in the school uniform, much more feminine in the pleated skirt and fitted blazer. Claudette was also frowned at the vampire. “Can I talk to you, in the hallway? Please?”

The vampire pouted at her. “Aw, but Claudette, class is about to start. You don’t want to miss classes on your first day back.”

“Julien.” Her frown turned into a glare as she growled the vampire’s name. He stood up, his hands up in defeat as he followed her out into the hallway.

Mason watched them as they left and as they walked back in. Both of their demeanors changed. Julien didn’t even look at him when he sat down and looked like it was killing him. Claudette nodded at him.

When class ended, Julien left without him and Claudette walked over to his desk with a smile. Mason shook his head and followed after the vampire, calling his name as he saw him turn a corner. When he didn’t turn around, the human started sprinting after him.

“Julien.” Mason stepped in front of the prince, who looked shocked to see him. “What did she say to you?”

“It doesn’t matter.” He moved to step away from the human boy, but Mason was too determined.

“It does. Whatever it is, it was about me right? Did she tell you to stay away from me?” The vampire looking away was enough of an answer for Mason. “I’m the only person who gets to decide who is and isn’t my friend. Claudette isn’t doing herself any favors to get on the list.”

“She’s right though, I’m-…”

“Someone I trust, with my life. Julien, you’re my friend.” Mason took a step closer. “And I was kind of hoping that you were interested in being more than friends.”

Julien turned to Mason then, his eyes wide and his cheeks flushed. “Mason, I-… I didn’t think you…”

Giving the vampire a sincere smile, Mason took one of his hands. Julien returned the smile until he heard both their names from down the hall. Both turned to see Fox charging for them. He wrapped his arms around their shoulders, pulling them apart.

“Come on boys, we’re all going to be late.”

Julien threatened the hunter’s life as Mason just laughed and let Fox lead him.

At lunch, Claudette was glaring at Julien as him and Fox were talking about something related to hunter policy. Vena was explaining something from history to Mason when Mason looked up at the werewolf.

“If you don’t like Julien, you could find somewhere else to sit.” Mason said very directly as he stared at her. Claudette flinched as if she had punched him.

“You seriously can’t trust the likes of him.” Claudette retorted.

“The likes of what Claudette, vampire?” Vena’s eyes were red as she glared at the other female. The werewolf’s eyes turned yellow in response.

“You’re on Cardia’s side, Vena?”

“He’s proven that he’s to be trusted, on multiple accounts. Had you been here from the beginning you might have known that.” Vena smiled at Claudette as she stood up. “If you have a problem with the spoiled prince, I have a problem with you.”

Mason watched her go as she left before looking back at Claudette, who had returned to glaring at Julien. Fox groaned and shook her shoulder. “Come on, what has Julien ever done to you? Honestly he’s as harmless as a butterfly.”

Julien snorted, shaking his head. “She’s just sore over the past. My ancestors may have enslaved yours, but that doesn’t mean that you’re allowed to hate me blindly.”

Seemingly ignoring that the vampire spoke, she turned her glare to Fox. “You too? How can you be so set against me?”

“Because you’ve been such a joy since we’ve met.” Mason rolled his eyes before glancing at Julien, who was calmly flipping through a paperback.

Without saying anything else, she got up and stormed off. Fox snorted, picking his fork back up. “Women.”

Julien and Mason both glared at him, and he just sighed. “Maybe the hormones are still effecting her brain. She really isn’t usually that bitchy.”

“I’m surprised she’s being so nice to Vena. She listens to her mother so much that I thought that she’d hate her too.” Julien closed the book, looking between the two.

“What do you mean? Her mom loves Vena.” Fox furrowed his eyebrows, staring at the vampire.

“Loved, perhaps. It was Claudette’s mother that wanted to imprison Vena with her master, after everything. Even your step-father didn’t suggest something that cruel.”

“What do you mean, imprison with…” Mason looked at Julien, the confused one now.

“That vile creature is in the deepest cellars of the Hunter’s base. Is that what they told the humans?”

“We were told that he was dead.”

Both the nonhumans shared an uneasy glance before getting up to head to class. Mason was left there to take up the tray the girls had left behind.

When Mason saw Vena again, she looked a little disheveled but she smiled at him. “I could grow used to the crown prince punching people on my behalf.”

He couldn’t help but laugh. “He warned everyone and they still try?”

“In class with him no less.” She pulled out the lab equipment that they were supposed to be using. “I’m glad you defended him against Claudette. She has no reason to actually hate him that I know of.”

“He’s my friend, I’m not going to let people bully him.”

“Only your friend? I’ve been sensing that something else was stirring.” She pushed the stuff towards him, hoping he’d just do the entire thing.

His face went red as he turned away. “That obvious is it? We haven’t known each other that long, I don’t know if it’s going anywhere…”

Vena nodded and gave him a serious look. “I like Julien, but it doesn’t change that getting involved with him would be complicated. You still know very little about the world you live in now, on top of everything he’s royalty.”

“I know, which is why I’m going to try to take things very slow, and try to learn as much as possible as fast as possible.” He finally took the hint and took the equipment before Vena pushed it off their lab bench.

“Sounds like you need me to come by after school again.” She grinned at him and moved into a more comfortable position to watch him do most of the lab.


	9. Chapter 9

During ethics, Mason heard Fox and Vena whispering. They were talking about Blain, which made him curious to whether or not he had seen him at all that day. At some point during their conversation, Vena yelled out “what” and got a very nasty glare from the teacher. Once class was over, Vena blew a breath out of her nose.

“Mason, change of plans. We’re going to my place after school, and so is Fox.”

It was Fox’s turn for a loud “what.” “What am I going to do at your place?”

“It’s obvious that our darling step father isn’t training you well enough, so I’m going to train you.” Vena looked at her baby brother with a wicked smile.

Fox groaned as he picked up his books, but didn’t make an effort to protest. Mason quickly picked his up so he could follow them as soon as they were ready.

“And we’re going to get Mason home before dark, so he doesn’t get attacked, again.” Vena turned her wicked grin to the human, who mimicked Fox’s groan.

When they finally made it to Vena’s building, instead of heading to the elevator, she headed toward a stair well. Both of the boys looked at each other in confusion. They went down a few flights of stairs, past the laundry room and the storage area to they were at the bottom and found themselves in what looked like a medieval training barracks.

“What was Blain hunting?” Vena asked as she put her foot up on a bench to untie her boots.

Fox followed her lead and shrugged off his jacket. “A rogue omega, I’m pretty sure.”

“Werewolves are pretty much impossible to take down once they go full shift.” Vena then started working on her tie. “What’s your weapon preference?”

He stared at her for a few seconds before looking around. “Anything I can shoot… but…” Before he could finish his sentence, Vena threw a small pistol at him. His eyes went wide. “There aren’t any targets in here…”

“We’re not trying to see if you can beat a piece of paper, Fox.” She rolled her eyes at him as she rolled her sleeves.

“No!” He dropped the gun and took a step back. “I’m not going to shoot you!”

“Vena…” Mason looked at her with a frown, not liking how this was going.

Picking up the gun, she sighed. Without warning, she pointed the gun at Fox and pulled the trigger. Fox screamed at the sound of the gun going off, but looked down to see a purple dot on his tie where he had been hit. When he looked back up at his sister, she looked smug.

“I would never ask you to hurt me.” Vena then held the gun back out to him. “They’re special training weapons.”

He took it back warily and looked over to Mason, who had finally sat down on one of the benches. “Are you going to be using a weapon?”

“Most of the things you will be hunting won’t be using weapons, but it doesn’t make them any less dangerous.”

“What do you usually use?” Mason asked as he rummaged through his book bag.

“A sword.” Vena smiled at him before glancing at Fox. “You ready?”

“I guess so?” He looked up from the gun, obvious a little unsure about sparing with Vena.

She nodded and jumped up, pulled a cord above her. The lights dimmed, making it difficult to see and Mason heard gears moving underneath them. Fox swore as a jumped back from a large obstacle rising from the floor.

“Vena?” Fox called as he held the gun at his side.

From where Mason was sitting he could faintly see a pair of bright red eyes. Vena took training very seriously. “You have to treat this as real Fox. What would you do if you were hunting an actual dangerous vampire?”

Even through the darkness, Mason could see the confused look he was giving him.

It took a while for Fox and Vena to actually start fighting. Fox was aimlessly wondering through the obstacles while Vena was very purposefully around Fox, sneaking behind him. Once they started fighting, it wasn’t a long fight. The lights made it difficult for Mason to see them, but he could hear the noises. Bone hitting bone, grunts of pain, shots being fired, the gun skidding across the ground, and then screaming.

When the lights turned back on, Vena had Fox pinned against the wall, her hand gripping his neck as she glared at him. He looked absolutely terrified of his older sister as he stared into her fading red eyes.

“The most important thing for you to remember when hunting, you’re also being hunted.” Vena growled it at him as she released him and looked behind her to find the dots from the bullets on one of the obstacles.

Fox looked away and wiped the blood from his split lip. “You’re… nevermind…”

She looked at him before pulling on the switch to lower the obstacles. “I was trying to scare you. Hunting is scary. You’re going to take something’s life, and that thing used to be a person. And if you don’t kill it, it’s going to kill you and not care.”

“Were you scared, when you…” He trailed off as the door opened and Peirce walked in. Peirce shook his head and walked over to the group.

“It’s been a while since you’ve been down here.” He looked at Vena with a curious smile.

“Blain got pretty hurt on his hunt last night. I wanted to make sure Fox is going to up to it on his first hunt.”

“Blain just had his first hunt? I had mine when I was like fourteen.” Peirce looked over at Fox who shrugged. “Anyway, how’d he do?”

“Mason could probably take him in a fight.” Vena smirked over at the human who flexed his arm with a wink. Fox huffed. “But he has potential.”

“I’m one of the best fighters in class.” Fox crossed his arms.

“But you won’t be fighting your classmates on the job kid.” Peirce patted his back. “Fighting a vamp or a wolf is completely different than fighting another hunter. Hell fighting a rogue hunter is different than sparing.”

“A rogue hunter?” Both boys asked together.

“Just like vampires and werewolves, hunters can lose their sanity. It’s usually hunger than drive vampires and werewolves to madness, hunters are different. The only thing hunters want when they lose their minds is death.” Vena closed her eyes. “My first hunt was a rogue hunter.”

Fox looked confused while Mason nodded. Peirce then chuckled and shook Vena’s shoulder. “Anyway, I was about to leave, so if you two want a ride home, you’ll need to take it now. I probably won’t be back until way passed your bedtime.”

Vena rolled her eyes as she shrugged away from Peirce’s touch. “I guess you’ll have to call me if you have any questions. I’ll see you tomorrow at school.”

Before leaving, Fox pointed at Vena, who jumped a little in surprise. “You’re staying after school tomorrow right? It’s the first soccer match of the year. Hunters v. Vampires.”

Vena rolled her eyes as she nodded. Mason laughed. “Is Julien on any teams?”

“He was on the tennis team. Now there is no longer a tennis court to play tennis on.” She shook her head as she gathered her discarded clothing. “So there is a no royalty doing sports rule.”

By Peirce’s anxious foot tapping, Mason assumed he’d have to ask what the prince did to destroy the tennis courts at a different time.


	10. Chapter 10

The school was surrounded by adults, all talking in whispers. They were most concentrated around the side of the building, where the sports fields were. A few of them paused to stare at him as he walked to the entrance. He looked past them to see a few stretchers with body bags. His pace quickened.

All of the prefects were standing in the lobby and there wasn’t anyone idly walking around. He immediately walked over to where Fox was standing with the werewolf head.

“Everyone is supposed to go to the auditorium, but you should make a deator to the girls’ bathroom. Vena’s having a massive panic attack and I think Peirce has his hands a little full…” Fox said with a sigh without even a greeting.

Mason nodded and looked around. “Where’s Julien?”

“Outside, with his father. He’s almost as worked up as Vena is.”

“What happened?”

“Let’s just say that the soccer game is canceled tonight.” John said without even a small amount of a smile. “But you should go, I’m sure Fox and Julien will tell you more later.”

He just nodded again before heading to the bathrooms. With a small knock, he walked into the girls’ room. Peirce looked at him from where he was bent in front of the tiny ball of crying and hyperventilating Vena. Mason didn’t say anything as he sat next to her.

As the three sat there in near silence, Vena’s breathing leveled out and her sobbing stopped. She leaned forward and pressed her face into Peirce’s shoulder as she reached for Mason’s hand.

Peirce shushed her as he wrapped his arms around her. “It’s alright. I promise, no matter what happens, I’ll protect you from that monster.”

“Don’t make promises you can’t keep, Peirce.” She pulled back, staring at him.

“I’m going to do everything I can to keep you safe.” He put her face in his hands and kissed her forehead, his lips lingering before he stood up. “But I should go back to the other hunters.”

The man looked at Mason. “Take care of her today, alright kid?”

Mason saluted him with his free hand before running his fingers through Vena’s hair as she put her head on his shoulder. After Peirce was gone, Vena started to say something, but Mason shushed her just as the hunter had. “If it hurts to talk about, don’t. I’ll find out from Julien later. Just try to keep yourself calm.”

Vena held his hand tighter. “Thank you.”

“It’s what friends are for, right?”

She just hummed. Their silence was only broken when Julien came in. “Hey, they’re starting. You should go, Mason.”

Julien was looking just next to the human, but Mason nodded and stood up anyway. “What about Vena?”

“Her and I are going to talk privately.” Vena looked up at the prince then and reached up to get Mason’s hands to her feet.

After Vena was on her feet, Mason took a few steps towards Julien. The vampire glanced at him and then quickly looked away. Touching his hand gently, Mason smiled. “Come find me later.”

“Of course.” A smile spread across his face as he squeezed the human’s hand.

When he entered the auditorium, Fox motion for him to come sit next to him in the back with the rest of the prefects. “Julien was acting weird…”

“The blood, there’s a lot out there. He was probably trying to keep from biting you.” Fox whispered as the lights dimmed down. “He looks like he wants to rip your throat out when he’s in a good mood… Are you… blushing?”

He hit the hunter as the headmaster walked onto stage followed by two men. Fox’s eyes went wide as he followed the one. “I didn’t know my stepfather was here…”

Mason looked at the two men and it was easy to see which was Fox’s stepfather, as the other was obviously related to Julien. The long white hair pulled back into a ponytail, a white beard to match; he looked very regal as he stood on the stage with his cane. Fox’s stepfather was short and thin, and pale, with dark hair and piercing eyes behind glasses; he looked more like a tax collector than a hunter.

“As I’m sure you’re all aware, there was a severe act of vandalism on our soccer field sometime last night. It was also an act of terrorism, the blood from the human victims and the messages were very clear in the attackers’ intent.” She took a deep breath and glanced at the two men standing behind her. “To tell you more about the investigation into the incident, head of the Hunter Judiciary, Alexander Sharpe.”

As he walked up to the microphone, he seemed to smirk. “This incident is unfortunate for those who were attacked, but we will be working this case as a top priority. There is evidence that his crime was committed by vampires who support the actions of Phinehas Dalca from five years ago. It is not certain as of yet whether this is actually true, but those are our preliminary findings. If any of you have information about the victims or the assailants, please do not hesitate to come forward. More lives could be lost like this if you withhold any information.”

When he backed away from the microphone, he turned to head off the stage. Mason glanced at Fox, who was tracking his step father’s movements warily.

“Thank you for your diligence, Mr. Sharpe. To explain the security measures that will be put into place around the school, His Majesty, Mathias Cardia, King of Vampires.” The headmistress said into the mic before bowing. As Julien’s father approached edge of the stage, he ignored the mic. The vampire section of the room all raised to their feet and bowed before he spoke.

“Please, be seated. It is grim, to think that an action like this would be performed in this place of peace and comradery.” The king’s voice was like velvet and Mason’s head was spinning from the sound. It was even more hypnotic than Julien’s. “It is my duty to see the security of this school and you students that strive towards a once unthinkable peace between us. Royal guards will be positioned around the school at all hours of the day. The utmost effort will be made to not interrupt normal school activities, but afterschool activities will be canceled until the culprits have been brought to justice. Pending further information from the hunters’ investigation, a city wide curfew will be put into effect to protect all citizens, especially our human allies, who are the most vulnerable of all.”

“Thank you, your majesty.” The headmistress bowed at him again before turning to address the students and teachers. “Today however, we are going to send you home to not interfere with the continuing inspection of the crime scene. If any of you feel unsafe, a hunter or royal guard will be available to escort you home. Prefects, if you could exit first to keep your classmates in an orderly fashion as they exit the building.”

Fox pushed on Mason to get out of the end seat so he could get up. Mason followed him and other prefects out to the lobby. He looked around and saw Julien talking to his father, just a few lockers down from where Vena was leaning.

Julien looked up at him with a smile. The king’s gaze followed his son’s and then Mason could see that the man had red eyes, not the glowing eyes of hunger, but just red and very intimidating. Without another word, the king turned to leave out one of the side entrances, giving Vena a quick nod before disappearing completely from view.

Once Julien let out a breath, Mason walked over to him. “So, that’s your dad huh?”

He nodded and rubbed his arm. “Yeah, pretty intimidating, isn’t he? When I take the throne, I’ll probably turn into him.”

Vena walked over then. “I don’t know if that’s a bad thing Julien. He’s the most fair of the leaders in the city.”

Fox glanced over at them as he was standing by and watching other students leave. He was about to leave his post to talk with them when he heard Alex call his name. Swearing, he walked over to his stepfather instead.

“Speaking of unfair leaders.” Julien mumbled as Vena’s eyes snapped to the man and narrowed to glare at him. “You going to be okay?”

“Define okay?” She spat it out, not even bothering to move her glare to the vampire.

Mason sighed and watched as Fox and the head hunter seemingly fought. He glanced at Julien. “Alex is trying to make him go home with him. Fox wants to make sure you and Vena get home okay.”

The fighting finally stopped and Fox looked back at them with a frown, pointing towards his stepfather. Mason waved at him. Julien rolled his eyes mentioning that the three of them should get going too, emphasizing that they were both the safest with him.

Fox and Alex were waiting outside a car when they got outside and were waiting for Julien’s car to pull around. Alex was on the phone, angrily listening to someone talk to him.

Alex dropped his phone before searching the crowd of students. His eyes finally settled on his stepdaughter. Fox said something to him, reaching out. Alex elbowed him in the face, knocking him to the crowd as he walked towards his target. He had his gun out before anyone could prepare, shooting four shots. The first two missed completely, and thankfully not hitting anyone that happened to be standing around them. The third hit Vena square in the chest. The fourth grazed Julien’s cheek as he ran towards the hunter, ripping the gun from his hand.

The gasping sound she made as she moved her hand to the wound was sickening. Mason moved to catch her before she fell to the floor. He didn’t know what to do as he watched blood pour from the wound and her eyes close. “Julien!”

“She is protected: this could be seen as an act of war, Sharpe.” Julien’s eyes were burning red as he glared at the older man.

“She had no right to be near my daughter.” Alex snarled at him.

“If you value your life, I suggest you leave now.” The prince let go of the gun, but was still staring down the hunter. Finally, Alex holstered it and turned. He forcefully scooped up Fox on his way back to his car, despite the boy’s protests.

Julien was quickly kneeling next to Mason, looking at Vena with a frown.

“Is she going to die?” Mason looked at him, not liking the look on the other boy’s face.

“She needs blood.” Julien looked up at him with a conflicted look. “Unconscious, she can’t…”

Before he could finish, he was being presented with Mason’s wrist. Julien took it, running his thumb along the pulse point, sending a shiver down the human’s spine. “You know what happens if I- if I bite you…”

“I’m not ready, but I want it, and it’s the only way to save Vena.” Mason smiled at him. With a small nod,  Julien sunk his fangs into the human’s wrist without hesitation. The sound Mason let out was quiet honestly embarrassing, but it didn’t matter then. It took all of Julien’s self-control to remove his mouth from the human’s skin, and when he did,  he stood up and walked a few feet away from them.

Vena’s instinct to drink kicked in when Mason placed his bleeding wrist to her mouth. Once she had drunk enough, she started to regain consciousness and moved her hand to hold his wrist to her mouth. As desperate as she was, she didn’t have much control and drank until he passed out and Julien was ripping his wrist away from her grasp.

“Vena?” Julien asked quietly as he looked at her. She groaned, sitting up and holding her now closed wound. He sighed when she looked at him, giving him a judgmental look. “You were dying, what did you want me to do? … I wasn’t going to let you die.”

Before either could say anything else, there was someone yelling Vena’s name. Both vampires looked to see Peirce running through the crowd. It had taken some time for word to spread to the investigation zone. When he finally reached them, he threw himself to the ground and hugged her tightly.

“I’m okay Peirce, I’m okay.” She sighed as she let him hug her. Her eyes went to Julien. “You should get him home, he needs rest.”

Julien just nodded and picked up at the human and walked over to his car, nodding to his driver as he laid Mason across his lap.


	11. Chapter 11

Mason opened his eyes with groan. His head hurt and he felt incredibly weak. He could hear his pulse in his ears, as his heart was trying make up for his lack of blood with more beats. Julien was looking out his window, staring at nothing.

“I was starting to fear she had killed you.” The vampire said without any conviction. He looked paler than usual. “I’ll go get you something to eat, it’ll help.”

“Wait…” Mason reached for Julien, but the vampire left the room without even looking at him. He groaned again as he sat up, with no small amount of effort.

When Julien came back in, he held out a glass of apple juice and a plate of toast. “How are you feeling?”

“Like a vampire sucked on my blood until I passed out.” Mason smiled at him before taking a few large gulps of the juice. “Are… Are you okay?”

“I’m not sure.” He sat on the edge of Mason’s bed and Mason then noticed the small mark on the vampire’s cheek from the bullet. “With the bond being permanent, all of my instincts are sort of going haywire. I have no idea how I’m going to keep them under control.”

Mason took a few bites of toast before reaching out to brush the injury on his cheek. “You’re doing a pretty good job right now.”

“Only because if I lost control, I’d kill you. I should go, but…” Julien shrugged away from the touch.

“If you want to go, I’ll be okay.” Mason’s smile fell slightly. The vampire just nodded and stood up. “Thank you, for everything.”

With a huff, Julien turned to smile at him. “I wouldn’t thank me too quickly. Call me if you need anything.”

After Julien had left, Mason finished his juice and toast before moving under the covers to get more sleep.

 

Vena hadn’t said anything to Peirce since they got in the car, or when they got home. She just when straight to the shower. Peirce changed his clothes and sat on the couch with a beer. When she came out, her hair dripping wet, she held out a brush to him.

“Haven’t done this in awhile.” He said it with a smile as she sat next to him on the couch, with her back to him.

“How are you feeling?” He asked as he started brushing her hair.

“I’m not really sure. It’s been awhile since I’ve had human blood.” She sighed and rearranged herself slightly. “And to have him be so ready to give it like that…”

“That kid really cares about you Vena, he’s got a strong heart.”

“I hope he’s okay. I took so much, I could’ve killed him.”

“But you didn’t. He saved your life. I might give him a medal.” He laughed and he knew she was rolling her eyes. “I’m sure the vampire prince is taking good care of him.”

Vena groaned. “Mason is Julien’s now; he bit him so he could give me his blood. I know they were… but they had to rush into it because of me.”

“What? So… poor kid.” He grunted in pain when she turned to hit him, harder than usual. “Sorry.”

“Julien Cardia is a lot of things, but I think he truly cares for Mason. He wouldn’t force him to do anything, manipulate maybe, but he wouldn’t…” Vena shivered and turned away again.

They sat in silence for a few minutes while Peirce continued to brush her hair. He was the one to break it again though. “You should call him, when I finish brushing your hair. You want to make sure he’s okay, and I’m sure he’d like to know that you’re okay.”

“Yeah, I should. Thank you. They’ll probably have school closed again tomorrow.”

“And I should help with any leg work for the investigation, what are you going to do?”

“I was thinking of going to Mason’s. I don’t want to be here alone when… and Mason shouldn’t be alone.”

“Sounds like a plan. I’ll drop you off there before I go into headquarters tomorrow then.”

“Thank you Peirce.”

He kissed the top of her head. “Of course.”

She made a small noise at the contact. “Think you could braid it too?”

“Anything you want.” He chuckled and started to section her hair as he continued brushing. With as much hair as she had, it was a big job to even brush it, much less braid it.

When he was finished, much later, she turned and smiled at him. With a small kiss to his cheek, she retreated back to her room. Peirce stared at the door the door with a sad smile before eventually getting up to find he was out of beer.

Mason answered his phone and Vena could hear the smile, and the exhaustion in his voice. “Hey. I’m glad you called.”

“How are you feeling?” Vena couldn’t help but smile too, knowing he was alive.

“Tired.” There was a pause that Vena  was unsure if she should have tried to fill. “It feels strange… the mark from Julien.”

“It's not really something you get used to, trust me.” She couldn't help but wince as she clutched at the mark left behind by the monster that had turned her. “But as long as you and Julien are good, it doesn't have to be a bad thing.”

Mason sighed, long and stressed. “I don't know if we are good. He looked… being here was hard on him.”

“He… he wouldn’t be used to it either. The way that bond affects him is entirely different. You both just need some time.”

“I won't ever regret this decision, even if my whatever with Julien doesn't turn out the way I expect.”

Vena smiled again. “Thank you, for making the decision to save my life. Peirce may kiss you next time he sees you though.”

“Bring it on!” Both were laughing at his enthusiastic response. He sighed once they had both settled down. “Are you okay?”

“I'm not dead, thanks to you and his highness. It's been awhile since I had human blood… It's kind of intense how strong I'm feeling right now.”

“Maybe you were due for some human blood? Watching you fight those vampires, it was a little terrifying, thinking that you were going to lose.”

“Maybe you’re right, but I can’t make a habit of drinking from you. You’re Julien’s now.”

Mason didn’t like the way she made that sound, like the prince owned him. He understood that was the way she understood bonds, from her own experiences and education, but he hoped that Julien didn’t feel that way about it. Vena must have felt the tension of the silence because she cleared her throat and changed the subject.

“They’ll probably keep school closed tomorrow, so they can finish with their investigation and clean up.”

“What… what are you going to do? You weren’t…”

“I was planning on hanging out at your house, if that’s okay with you?” Vena sounded desperate as she spoke.

“Of course. Maybe you can help me catch up on some of my harder homework.”

Her laugh was hollow. “Good. I’ll see you tomorrow.” When she hung up she focused on the loud banging and thuds coming from the kitchen. She sighed as she got up to save Peirce from whatever he was trying to cook for dinner.

He looked at her helplessly as she approached. The hunter hadn’t even started to cook anything, just getting out pots and seasonings. “So, how’s Mason?”

With her arms crossed, she just stared at him.

“Could you help me? You always rearrange the kitchen and I can never find anything.”

“I never touch the kitchen. The only things I get from this kitchen are apple juice and sandwiches.” She continued staring him down. “It’s not my fault if you forget where you put things.”

Peirce’s pout eventually made her smile and shoo him out of the kitchen. He stood by the entrance and watched her. He always planned on actually learning to cook, or to organize a kitchen effectively, but the smile Vena always had when she cooked always changed his mind.

She held him out a plate when she finished, and headed back towards her room. He grabbed her arm. “Why don’t you grab a small plate and join me? It’s been a long time since we’ve sat down and had dinner together.”

Her stare was intense as she considered him. Eventually she nodded and turned back into the kitchen. It was silent, but pleasantly so as they sat opposite each other at their rarely used table. Once they had finished, Vena sat on the counter next to the sink as Peirce did dishes.

“It’s been a rough day on both of us. I think it would be best if we just go to bed.” He smiled at her after drying his hands. She nodded and jumped off the counter. When he called out his ‘good night’, he didn’t get an answer so he headed to his own room.

A few minutes after he had settled into bed, his door opened. He looked over at the silhouette of Vena in the doorway. “What’s up?”

“Can… Can I stay in here with you, tonight?”

“Of course.” He pulled back the covers from the other side of the bed. She crawled in next to him and pressed against his side. “So it’s one of these nights, huh?”

She just made a small sound of agreement as he gently wrapped an arm around her.


	12. Chapter 12

“You look pale…” Were the first words out of his mother’s mouth when she walked in the door. She walked over to where he was laying on the couch and watching cartoons, putting one of her hands on his forehead and the other on his own.

“One of my vampire friends almost died today.” He smacked at her hand as he sat up. “School’s canceled for tomorrow, so some of my friends are coming over to work on homework and study and stuff…”

His mother blinked at him for a while before shaking her head. “I’m not sure about you going to that school. Did this vampire friend…”

“I offered it to her.”

“Her? Are you…”

“No! We’re just friends. We’re just really good friends.” He stood up and immediately sat back down. “Going back to my old school wouldn’t make me stop being friends with…”

“Have you spoken to your old friends since you started at…”

It was so typical of their conversations like this. They were both so impatient for the conversation to be over that neither of them let them finish a sentence. “Of course. They all have asked me how things are. Most of them want to meet my new friends…”

“Are you sure that’s such a good idea? Sure your new friends haven’t…”

“They’re not going to attack anyone! Mom, I trust them.”

She sighed and turned away from him. They were both silent until she sighed again and pulled out her cell phone. “You hungry? I feeling Chinese tonight.”

“Chinese sounds great Mom.” He laid back down and reached for the remote.

 

Mason woke up to the vague sound of someone knocking on the front door. He groaned and rolled over, hearing his Mom yell his name from downstairs. His alarm clock told him that it was well before when he’d have to be up for school, and his mom was still home. It was too damn early for visitors.

He walked downstairs and stared sleepily at the blurry shape standing just inside the door. “Vena? Do you know what time it is?”

“Sorry… Peirce wanted to get an early start at headquarters… which isn’t very like him.”

“So, Mason, this is one of your new friends?”

“Yeah, this is Vena. Vena, this is my mom.” He motioned between the person shaped blobs.

“It’s nice to meet you Mrs. Ramos.”

“You too Vena.” She moved towards the door. “I have to get to work, have a good time today.”

Once the door was shut, Vena chuckled. “You look like you want to go back to bed. I agree, go back upstairs, I’ll crash on the couch until a reasonable hour.”

A few hours later he woke up to his phone ringing. He reached for it and heard Fox’s overly cheery voice in his ear. “Morning! I’m on your street, but I don’t remember which house is you-… never mind, I figured it out!”

The hunter hung up and Mason rolled out of bed, rummaging through his dresser for clothes. Knocking started and he yelled down for Vena to let her brother in the house.

When he got down stairs again, he found Fox hugging his sister, and Vena standing there, tense with a hand awkwardly on his back. Claudette was standing by the door with her hands in her pockets, rocking back and forth until the awkward moment was over.

“Sorry.” Fox muttered when he finally released her. “I was just really glad that you’re not dead.”

“It’s okay. I’m just not…” She smiled at him and shrugged. “You understand.”

Claudette glanced over at Mason. “You look like shit there, hero.”

“I did get eaten by a vampire yesterday, so sorry.” He smiled, glancing at Vena.

“Two vampires technically, since Julien bit you.” She smiled back at him.

The hunter and the werewolf both looked terrified by that, staring Mason with wide eyes. Fox put his hand up towards Claudette to keep her from making any snide remarks. “Do you know what that… what is…”

“Not completely, but Vena was dying? At the time it seemed like the only option.” He shrugged. “I’ll figure it out, and I’ll deal with it. Julien’s my friend.”

“Julien Cardia is…” Claudette took a step forward, her eyes glowing yellow. She was cut off my Vena taking a step in front of her, her own eyes glowing red.

“What exactly is Julien Cardia? If he does do something to hurt Mason, I will take care of it, but until then, you stop these causeless attacks.”

She scoffed and looked away, seemingly in fear. “You’re going to take down Julien Cardia?”

“Yes. And I’ve already warned him.”

Fox stepped between the two girls. “Oh my God. Can we stop with threatening each other? Maybe instead of everyone getting our glowy eyes on, we maybe explain to Mason what being bitten by Julien means?”

The two girls stared at him like he had spoken some foreign language neither of them knew. Mason headed to his kitchen to get some breakfast. “Or by all means, kill each other, but do it outside. My mom would kill me if you guys got blood and guts everywhere.”

When there was no noise from the entry way of the house, but the tension in the air seemed to be released, he smiled to himself. “So, who wants breakfast? I can make scrambled eggs and toast.”

After they had finished eating, in silence, the four sat at the rarely used dining room table. The three nonhumans were all sharing glances, occasionally looking at Mason.

“You two really do that ‘hot and cold’ thing, don’t you?” Mason sighed and he stood up to at least put all their plates in the sink. “I assume you’re all silently trying to decide how best to talk to me about my magical vampire soul bond with Julien?”

Fox joked on the drink he had just picked up. “You’re not freaking out enough about this for my liking.”

“Just because you’d be in the fetal position if this happened to you doesn’t mean Mason should be.” Vena leaned across the table and leered at her younger brother.

“Big talk from someone like you.” Claudette scoffed.

“You’re right. The mark the monster that turned me left hurts every day. There were days that I clawed at it until I passed out from blood loss. Are you saying that Mason should be doing that too?”

“I knew I should not have invited all of you over here at one time.” Mason sat back down. “Guys, I don’t need you to fight; I don’t need to you tell me how I should be reacting; I need you to tell me what this mark is going to do to me and having it from the vampire crown prince means. You think you can handle that, or are we going to have to get something to pass around so only one person can talk at once?”

“I’m going to have you over next time I have to babysit Jenny. She’ll probably listen to you.” Fox looked at his friend, thoroughly impressed.

“I volunteer at a day care over the summer.”

They waited until Mason had finished cleaning up breakfast to start their very serious chat about his and Julien’s relationship. As they sat in the living room, they all stared at each other to figure out who was going to speak first. It turned out it was going to be Fox.

“Shouldn’t this be a conversation for you and Julien to have?”

“Julien needs to figure things out on his end. This is all new to him. The connection between a vampire and someone they marked… you really don’t understand the bond until you’ve had it, trust me.” Vena rubbed at her chest as she looked at the floor.

“Not to mention that his dad is probably keeping him busy about what happened to the school yesterday. We’re going to have to give Mason facts at least.” Claudette sat back, making herself comfortable.

“Julien doesn’t need to be the one to tell me what the physical and social changes this mark is going to cause for me, he and I just need to talk about what the bond means for us, for our relationship.”

The books Julien had given him had mentioned, briefly, the marks that high ranking vampires left behind when they bit people, but it was nowhere enough detail for Mason’s liking. It also focused on the mark and turned vampires, and not as much about humans with the mark. He knew Julien could sense his emotions and locations, pretty much constantly. He knew that if he tried hard enough, he could sense Julien.

Vena did most of the talking, though sometimes she would stop midsentence, shaking slightly. When that happened, Claudette took over and Fox gently rubbed his sister’s back. Mason knew what she experienced was completely different than what he would with Julien, but watching her react like that make him terrified that he had a made a mistake with Julien.

He learned that Julien could call for him. It was possible to fight a call, depending on circumstances including distance and Julien’s strength, it would be more or less difficult to do so. There were also a few simple commands that Julien could use on him, that he couldn’t fight, like ‘don’t move’ or ‘sit down’. It wasn’t much, but knowing how much power that Julien had over him was intimidating.

On top of their strength and powers, vampires could so easily control others and Mason finally understood why they were so terrifying, why the hunters hated them so much.

“But what about… I’m sure with me being the crown prince, there’s something…” Mason didn’t know exactly how to ask where he fit in the world of vampire politics, but he knew he had to know.

“The king of the vampires is allowed two mates that get political power. At least one has to be a born vampire of the opposite sex, for heir making.” Vena tilted her head to the side. “We just learned about this the other day, I’m trying to remember the different titles.”

“Well, Julien’s wife will obviously be called ‘queen.’” Claudette scoffed, receiving a glare from Fox. Mason wondered why the two were friend if they fought so often.

“There’s a specific chain of command. King, Queen, King consort, crown prince or princess, prince, princess, prince consort, and princess consort. You’ll be a ‘prince consort’ once Julien takes the throne.”

“The king’s second mate is a woman too, so what’s she is called?” Fox looked at his sister in confusion.”

“Princess consort. Julien’s little brother is still a prince, so she has less political power than her eight year old son.” Vena chuckled slightly. “But the King or queen get to actually decide what to call their partners, so Julien may choose to have you addressed as king consort.”

“But what if Julien and I decide not to become a couple? What happens to me if that doesn’t happen?” Mason didn’t know for sure how he felt about Julien. He liked him, a lot, but they had only known each other a little over a week.

“You’d become just a servant in the royal household. Holding the mark of the king, you’d be a high ranking servant, like one that just announces guests and yell at other servants.” Claudette sighed.

“Sounds like that’s a conversation for you and Julien then.” Fox stood up. “But with him out of contact right now, we might as well get caught up on school work. We have that ethics test to study for.”

“There’s also a history test coming up.” Vena gave him a cruel grin.

Mason groaned and slowly fell off the couch and onto the floor. “I give up. I’m going back to human school.”

Vena chucked her history notebook at her, yelling and laughing at the same time.

 


	13. Chapter 13

Claudette happened to glance up at Mason and found him staring at her. “What?”

“Uh, sorry… I just don’t know…” He looked away quickly. “Sorry.”

“What? You don’t know a lot about trans people?”

“No, no. I know a few trans humans. I don’t really know a lot about werewolves.” He shrugged.

“To be fair, you don’t know much about hunters or vampires either.” Vena said without looking up from her homework.

“But I know even less about werewolves.” Mason emphasized.

“Well, what do you want to know?” Claudette put down her own homework.

The two siblings groaned. “You’re going to regret that,” Vena said as she buried her face in her textbook. “Don’t encourage him,” Fox got up and headed towards the kitchen.

Both the human and werewolf glared at them, before Claudette smiled at Mason softly. “We’re pretty different than vampires and hunters. Most wolves just want to live their lives, not too unlike humans so I hear.”

“Hunters are literally just slightly more powerful humans.” Fox looked at her, completely unimpressed.

“But what do you know about humans? Hunters are too obsessed with their ‘ _sacred duties’_ to look around and interact with their meek cousins.” Claudette smiled at him, obviously mocking him with her expression. “Most werewolves live completely undetected among humans.”

“Come on, you guys react to everything, constantly growling at people.” Fox threw his arms up.

“No. Just at you because you’re stupid.” She rolled her eyes. “Last I heard from Gavner he was living with some humans not too far from here.”

“What?” Vena stared at the werewolf with confusion and sadness competing for real estate on her face.

“Yeah, he left the pack not too long after they found you. Him and mom a lot of disagreements.” She sighed and shrugged. “He sends John and me updates occasionally, but not as often as I would like.”

“He’s an omega, how can he…” Vena ran her fingers through her hair, looking like she was deep in thought.

“He’s working at headquarters, a guard down in the prison.” Fox looked at his sister. “I think he’s one of the guards for _his_ cell.”

“Who’s Gavner?” Mason asked while Vena quietly withdrew into herself.

“My older brother.” Claudette glanced at Vena.

“He and Vena were really good friends before… yeah.” Fox shrugged.

Vena excused herself to go to the bathroom for a while. All three of the them followed after her with their eyes, quiet for a few minutes.

“Anything else, about werewolves?” Claudette asked, getting tired of the silence.

“Oh, yeah… I know vampires can’t be trans, because they can’t change at all…”

“When did you find that out?” Fox gave him a strange look.

“Julien and I were talking about the other night… via texting?” Mason gave the hunter an equally strange look, causing Claudette to chuckle.

“Werewolves are different, we can change, easily. It’s sort of the point.”

“But, you’re wolf form was female, right?” Mason’s face went red, embarrassed that he had noticed the first night they met.

“That’s the thing about being trans and werewolf. My wolf form is female, but my human form had male parts. Switching to match my wolf is fine, as far as our society is concerned. If my wolf form was male and I was still trans, I’d be living a completely different life.”

Mason nodded, looking away. “So, because you’re switching to match your wolf form, will you be able to…”

“Yeah, I’ll be able to get pregnant in my human form once I fully transition, which must seem weird. I know that humans are pretty much done with babies once they switch.” Claudette shrugged. “Actually, I can currently get pregnant in my wolf form, but I’d have to stay in that form until the baby’s born. In this form I could totally get another girl pregnant still.”

“Ew.” Fox wrinkled up his nose.

Claudette smacked him with one of the throw pillows. “If you think its so gross you can find someone else to suck your dick.”

“Oh.” Mason stared at the two of them. That explained a lot about why they put up with each other even though they disagreed on a lot.

“I’m going to go throw up now.” Vena said, turning around to head back to the bathroom.

After Fox ran after his sister and made her sit down, with a ill expression on her face, Mason smiled at them. “So, how long have you guys been…?”

“Pretty much since I came out.” Claudette smirked at the hunter, who was hiding behind a pillow. “When I told him, he blinked at me for a while and then let out a relieved breath before shouting ‘So I’m not gay!’”

Vena doubled over laughing and Mason smiled at him. “Dude, you’re ridiculous.”

“Yeah, well, I was once having crisis for a while about liking her.” Fox retorted, still behind the pillow.

“And you’ve adjusted well to playing with my dick.” Claudette grinned at him.

“As your sister and friend, I’m really happy for you two, but I might actually throw up if you keep talking about your sex life.” Vena smiled at them.

They both apologized as Mason picked his homework back up. The other three followed his example, quiet falling over them again.


	14. Chapter 14

Mason woke, in a cold sweat, to his phone buzzing next to his head. He put on his glasses so he could see the clock across the room as he answered it. His alarm, he must have forgotten to set it.

“Peirce and I are outside if you want a ride.” Vena’s voice cmae through his phone.

“Yeah, just give me a second.” Mason said, his voice cracking from morning grogginess.

He got in the car, yawning. Vena turned around from the front seat, her nose wrinkled up. “You okay?”

“Just… nightmare.” He ran his fingers through his hair, slightly damp from the sweat.

“Like marked by a vampire nightmare, or…?” Vena turned back around as Peirce started driving.

“No, like something terrible happening, it seemed so real.”

“Maybe you have the gift of seeing the future. Some humans have gifts like that, and sometimes it takes a supernatural to wake up those abilities.” Peirce said matter of factly.

“I hope not, not what I saw.” Mason looked out the window. It was raining, so it was pretty dark.

Julien was leaning against the wall, Claudette and Fox both bombarding him with questions. He pushed them both aside the second that Mason walked into the building, walking towards him and Vena.

Mason smiled at him, but the prince stopped himself short, over a foot away from them. “How are you doing? Is everything…”

He stopped talking as Mason wrapped his arms around his neck, pulling the vampire in for a hug. “I’m fine. You worry too much.”

“I worry just the right amount.” Julien was smiling as he pried the human off him. “I don’t know what I’d do…”

“Come on, just because you’ve marked me, suddenly you’re so sentimental?” Mason was still smiling, mocking him slightly. The prince reached for him, but withdrew his hand.

“Vena. Can we talk before school starts?” His smile was gone and he looked at her seriously. Vena nodded, gently touching Mason’s shoulder before following the other vampire.

“Trouble in paradise?” Fox asked as he walked over, the werewolf on his tail. She smacked him in the stomach, while smiling at the human.

“I thought you didn’t like Julien?” Mason looked at her.

“I like Julien, I just have reservations about the two of you, but what’s done has been done. He’s only trying to protect you.”

“From what? He’s the crown prince of vampires.” Mason couldn’t help but laugh, what could Julien possibly be afraid of?

“Exactly.” Fox sighed, rubbing his stomach. “He’s never really been around humans, he’s afraid he’s going to break you. And even if he doesn’t, he’s not without enemies.”

“Enemies?”

“Just like a pack alpha, the king of the vampires can be challenged, asked to step down. Not everyone if going to like a king.” Claudette shook her head. “But we should head to class before we’re late.”

Julien and Vena both walked in after the bell, and neither of them looked too excited. Mason looked at each of them, but Vena just grimaced and Julien promised they’d talk later.

“Vena and I have to fight.” Julien said as he gathered up his books. Several of the students looked at him, a weird expression on each of their faces.

“What?”

“For class. To pass, we all have to win at least one fight.” Vena explained, leaning against her desk. “I’m not allowed to fight because I have an unfair advantage because I’m hunter and vampire.”

“And I’m the crown prince, so you can see the school reluctance to have me fight.”

“But you guys are both… But only one of you can win.”

“They assured us that we’ll both be passing, no matter who wins.”

“The winner gets an A.”

“So, you’re coming to the fight, right?” Fox said at lunch. Both Vena and Julien were missing. “They’re canceling the next two classes because so many of us want to watch.”

“I think it’s sad that you want to watch your big sister get her ass kicked.”

“My sister is going to wipe the gym floor with Julien.”

“Uh-huh…”

“Fox, what happens if one of them accidently hurt the other?”

“Then, you my dear friend, might be dishing out some more of the elixir you store in your veins.”

“I think I’d die if anyone drank my blood right now.”

“They’ll both be fine. They’re both well trained fighters, they know when to stop.” Claudette reassured him. “And I’m sure it will be something to see. The two strongest, most talented fighters in the school’s history?”

“I thought you weren’t excited?”

“I am. I said you shouldn’t be Foxxy.” She stood up. “Come on, I want good seats.”

“Not in the splash zone, please?” Fox followed after her. Mason rolled his eyes, taking a few more bites of his meal before following them both to the gym.

There were already several people sitting in the stands in the gym. Mason could hear people calling for bets. He had seen both Julien and Vena fight, and he honestly didn’t see the hype. Julien had just sort of blindly killed everyone that had opposed him while Vena put all of her effort in defense.

Mason spotted Blain, he was talking to one of the people taking bets. Fox and Claudette followed his gaze.

“He’s betting against Vena, pathetic.” Claudette scoffed, glaring at him.

“Didn’t you say that Julien was going to win?” Fox stared at her.

“She’s not _my_ sister.” She grabbed Fox’s arm, “Come on, let’s sit over there.”

The excitement in the air was making Mason nervous. Claudette and Fox were talking as if two of the people he cared most about weren’t about to get into a giant fight. He wasn’t even sure if he was breathing.

When Julien and Vena finally came out into the gym, they stood by the doors to the locker rooms, talking quietly, ocassionally looking up at the stands. They were both just wearing their uniforms, just discarded their ties and jackets.

“They sound so thrilled.” Claudette said, leaning forward. “I think they were both hoping to get out of fighting at all.”

“They’re pretty much friends now, it can’t make it any easier.” Mason frowned, glancing at Fox who was grinning.

“You kidding me, me and my friends love sparing in class.”

“It’s not the same as the two of them. If either of them do poorly…” Claudette gave him a side eyed glare.

One of the teachers came out then, grabbing a microphone. He went over some emergency procedures in the event of anything going wrong. Mason felt the hairs on the back of his neck standing up as he spoke, and he looked over at Vena and Julien and found that they were both staring at him intently. It sent a shiver down his spine.

When he finally finished, he quickly went into a corner where there was a metal cage, pulling out a clipboard. Vena and Julien grabbed each other’s hands before heading to the center of the gym.

It stared in a blur. Julien ran towards Vena and she jumped up, flipping behind him. Mason had difficulty following the fight as the two spent several minutes running and jumping at each other, neither of them landing a blow.

Vena landed the first blow, a kick straight to Julien’s face. She waited for a few seconds for him to stand back up and crack his nose back into place before going in for another kick. He grabbed her leg, twisting it before dropping her onto the ground.

Once she was on the ground, she swept her legs under his so he was on the ground two. They both got up and jumped back from each other. The seconds dragged on until they quickly rushed each other.

Julien flew into one of the gym light, the bulb busting and the other lights starting to flicker from impact. He landed on his feet, but was twitching from the electrical current. With the lights going on and off, he could see that both Vena and Julien’s eyes were glowing red. He looked around and saw several glowing red and yellow eyes in the crowd.

When Vena rushed Julien again, he grabbed her throat, slamming her to the ground. She punched his arm, making him release him, kicking him away from her. They were both too into it.

Mason saw the teacher get out of the cage, running towards them, yelling both of their names, but the fighting continued. A few of the other students were gasping. He could feel how tense Fox was beside him. Everyone was too scared of both of them to intervene.

He started running down the aisle of the stands, down to the center. They were both at separate ends again, but they were getting ready to rush again. A few people were yelling at him, but he needed to stop it. Neither of them would hurt him, he knew that for a fact.

As he got to the center, the two had just started rushing towards each other, but they both stopped a few paces on either side of him. The red in their eyes faded, both of them falling to their knees, grabbing the worst of their injuries.

“You’re an idiot.” Vena grunted as she held her leg.

“What the hell were you thinking?” Julien was furiously glaring at him as he held his arm.

“Neither of you would hurt me.” He looked between the two of them. Fox and Claudette were running down towards them. “You two need to see the nurse.”

They were both chuckling. Claudette and Fox picked Vena up, helping her to limp. Mason offered a helping hand to the prince, who just rolled his eyes, wrapping and arm around his shoulders. Mason smiled at him as he wrapped an arm around his waist.

“Remind me not to get either of you mad.” Claudette grinned as she said it.

“Nah, its fine. Just use Mason as a meat shield and you’ll be fine.” Fox looked around his sister to grin at the werewolf.

“I’ll crawl to the infirmary. It’s fine.” Vena groaned.


	15. Chapter 15

The nurse was not surprised to see them, she just sighed and pointed at the cots before disappearing into the back.

“She’s probably going to rebreak your bones so they set right.” Claudette leaned against the counter. Fox grimaced, pointing towards the door before slowly walking towards it.

“It’s okay, you guys can do, thanks.” Vena smiled at each of them before laying back on the bed.

Fox sighed gratefully and pulled the werewolf out. Mason stood next to the cot he had help Julien on, looking at the prince. “You okay?”

Julien looked up, his eyes unfocused and his body shaking slightly. “You should go. Vena and I will be okay.”

Mason shook his head. “I don’t want to. I want to make sure both of you are okay.”

“We will be, please… I just…” Julien held his head with his uninjured arm as he looked away from the human. Mason reached towards him, but stopped when Vena said his name.

He looked over at her, and she was glaring at him. Shaking his head, he finally left the room.

Fox and Claudette were both standing outside. Claudette looked over at him with a frown.

“Don’t say it.” Mason kept walking, heading to class. Fox and Claudette shared a glance before following him.

 

Julien wasn’t around in the morning before school the next day. Vena was walking fine, as she came in. Mason smiled at her.

“You sure you’re alright?” He asked her. She nodded, glancing at her brother who shrugged.

“You guys see Julien? I need to talk to him.”

“Haven’t seen him yet, but he’s here somewhere.” Claudette shrugged, then looked at Fox. “I’m pretty sure my brother was talking about a prefect meeting before school.”

Fox’s face fell. “You’re joking right? Blain isn’t that much of an asshole that he wouldn’t tell me, would he?”

“He really is though Fox.” Claudette patted his check as the first bell rang.

Vena smiled at Mason, shrugging. “Guess I’ll have to talk to him after class, come on.”

Julien walked into class when John just as the late bell was ringing. He didn’t look at Mason as he came in, and it made the human’s heart sink. Vena’s eyes followed the prince and she gave him a strange gaze when he looked her way. The tension in the air was off the charts.

When class finally ended, Julien walked to Mason’s desk, leaning on it but never looking at him. “Can I talk to you?”

Mason stood up, nodding. He was filled with dread. “Yeah, of course.”

They ended up in one of the lesser used hallways, it was almost completely empty as the next classes should’ve been starting. Mason could see Vena leaning on the wall at the hallway enterence, which was the most terrifying part.

“Julien, is everything alright?” Mason reached for him, but Julien just batted his hand away. “You want to talk, please… tell me what’s wrong?”

Julien pinned him against the lockers, his eyes red and his lips only a short distance from Mason’s. Mason’s heartbeat was beating fast, way faster than it should’ve been. It was just like his dream.

The red faded from Julien’s eyes and he frowned. “Sorry… I can’t…” He put his forehead on Mason’s shoulder. “I’ve never felt like this way before. I’m going crazy. I’m so scared I’m going to do something I’m going to regret.”

“I trust you.” Mason wrapped his arms around the vampire. Julien lifted his head slightly and Mason could feel him tense in his arms.

“Julien.” Vena’s voice was harsh as she called down the hallway. Julien pulled away from Mason, covering his mouth. His fangs were obvious despite his efforts.

Mason took a step towards him, but Vena was standing next to him, her arm out to stop him. Julien backed himself against the other wall, slamming his fists against the lockers so hard that they bent all the way to the wall.

“I need some time… I can’t be near you right now.” Julien was crying now. Vena was looking at the prince sadly, as she wrapped an arm around Mason. “I can’t…”

“Julien, this will pass. You will get passed this.” Vena was hoping the human tightly, despite his efforts to get closer to Julien. “You’re the Crown Prince of Vampires. You can control yourself, you have to control yourself. In a little less than a week, he’ll be able to give you blood. That’ll help.”

Julien turned away, his body shaking again. He didn’t say anything as he walked away. Mason watched him leave, shouting his name a few times, but not getting an answer. Once he was out of sight, Vena finally released him.

“The bond is affecting him a lot. It’s probably because you mean so much to him.” Vena was still staring at the two broken lockers. “I remember being the same way with Peirce in the beginning.”

“You and Peirce are bound?” Mason looked at her, wiping his eyes. He wasn’t crying but he was close to it.

“Yeah. I don’t have my own mark, but that first bite… the scars are still there on his shoulder.” Vena looked at him. “It’s probably the only reason our relationship works at all. Otherwise, I don’t know how we’d live together.”

“So, do you love him?”

She smiled and shrugged. “It’s not as simple as that. I know what he feels for me, I taste it every time I take his blood, but… it could never work, and he knows that. What both of us would want from… whatever it is we would be, is the opposite of what the other needs.”

“Have you told him this?”

“He hides his feelings because he thinks that they’d hurt me, and because he doesn’t want to get his hopes up. I don’t know how to tell him anything.” She closed her eyes. “Peirce isn’t the easiest person to talk to.”

“I think he’d understand.” Mason smiled at her. “You guys have been together, for what, five years? You two probably know each other pretty well by now.”

She rolled her eyes at him. “Shouldn’t you be more concerned with your own relationship drama?”

“Helping others with theirs has always helped…” Mason shrugged. “So, what has it been like, living with Peirce all these years? From what I’ve seen, he’s an idiot but he loves you a lot.”

“That’s pretty much a good summary.” Vena laughed, leaning against the lockers. “It wasn’t always like this. I used to hate him, and he used to treat me like I was made of glass.”

Mason nodded, he wanted to know more. Vena didn’t have many other people to talk to, he wanted to be there for her, if she wanted him to be.

“I suffered for almost a year before I finally took his blood, constantly puking up the fake stuff. I wanted him to just take me out of my misery, but he always just wiped my face with a smile before sending me to my room to lie down.”

“So, when do you think you fell in love with him?” Mason smiled at her softly and she looked at with an odd expression before smiling.

“It was probably when he helped me cut and dye my hair.” She laughed at his shocked expression. “It was not too long after the first time I took his blood. _He_ is obsessed with my hair, and I was tired of looking it, lugging it around. I started chopping it off one day when he was out. Peirce had mentioned once how much he liked it too, so when he came home and yelled ‘what are you doing?’ I thought he was pissed, but he just helped me make sure the cut didn’t look like a six year old did it. He went out and got me a box of hair dye.”

Mason was smiling at her. “That was sweet.”

She rolled her eyes, nudging his shoulder. “Come on, we should get back to class.”

“We’re already late to the one already happening, we might as well wait until next period.”


	16. Chapter 16

Mason had just crawled into bed. He was staring at the black mark in the crook of his elbow. It had almost been a week since he’d last seen the vampire that had left the mark; the fang marks on his wrist had finally healed. He couldn’t stop thinking about Julien: his strange purple eyes, his touch, his stupid fanged grin, the way he was acting the last time they had seen each other. It was frustrating, even with Vena and Fox constantly reassuring him.

It was just as he was groaning and turning over to get some sleep that he heard a faint tapping sound. He shook his head and closed his eyes. The same sound, but louder. Either he under estimated that movies got the creepy factor of vampires right and Vena or Julien was at his window, or he was going to be killed by a terrible window tapping monster.

When he pulled up his blinds, he found Julien’s face staring though the glass. Mason would’ve sighed in relief if not for the conflicted look that the vampire was wearing.

“You okay?” Mason asked as he watched the vampire crawl into the room.

Julien didn’t make eye contact with him as he stood stiffly by the window. “I just…” He narrowed his eyes and balled his hands in fists as if he was in pain.

The human reached out to touch his shoulder in comfort, but Julien brushed it off and turned to crawl back out the window. “Never mind. I shouldn’t have come. I’m sorry.”

“Hey.” Mason grabbed his wrist, the wrist with his mark, and the vampire let out a desperate whimper. “It’s been almost two weeks, I know you have to be desperate.”

“Mason… I can’t…”

“I don’t know a lot about blood drinking, but I know I was the first human you’ve ever drank from. Whatever else you usually drink can’t be as good.”

Julien tensed at the words, pulling his wrist out of Mason’s hand forcefully.

“I know what I signed up for, that first time you took my blood. All you have to do is ask, your highness.”

He turned to look at the human, his irises not the purple that intrigued him but the bright red that sent shivers down his spine. The prince’s voice cracked as he opened his mouth. “M-Mason… Can I… may I drink your blood?”

“Yes.” When the word left his lips, he felt himself being picked up and then gently set on his bed. Julien hovered over top of him and stared down at him.

“S-Sorry… a little too ex-…”

Mason reached up and cupped the vampire’s cheek. “Stop worrying. A little warning would’ve been nice, but the bed is definitely the best choice, in case I faint again.”

The vampire grimaced but the human just chuckled, using his hand to guide his face to his neck gently. Julien nuzzled into the skin that connected the neck to the shoulder before taking a long sniff. As lips ghosted over the sensitive skin, Mason bit his lip to suppress the frankly embarrassing noises trying to escape his mouth. Fingers gripped Julien’s hair as he let his tongue trace the path of the blood hidden below the skin. He tugged on the collar of Mason’s t-shirt to get the fabric out of his way.

Mason let out a whimper of pain as the fangs broke skin. Julien let his free hand run down his side soothingly as he pulled back to lap and suck at the wounds. Soon the sounds coming from the human turned from ones of pain to ones of pleasure and he was sure it was another of his dreams as he clung to the vampire. He could feel Julien’s erection against his thigh and his own was occasionally brushed by Julien’s jeans.

When Julien finally finished, Mason felt exhausted. He let his arms fall to his sides as the vampire rose up to look at him. He tensed when he looked into the vampire’s eyes. They weren’t the same red anymore. Julien’s eyes were the same dark, almost brown red as the rogue vampires he watched be killed.

“Julien?” Mason asked cautiously as he watched Julien lick his lips. He started inching up to get out from under him, but the vampire put one hand firmly on his shoulder. Before he could get another word out, lips were on his. The kiss was earnest and cautious. It drew out another moan from the human as he tasted his own blood, still warm and completely disgusting. If he wasn’t absolutely sure that Julien had lost his mind, he might’ve even liked it.

Before Julien broke the kiss, he ripped Mason’s shirt off. When he did pull his lips off the human’s, he started trailing them down his chest, stopping occasionally to ghost his fangs over the skin.

“J-Julien… stop… please…” Mason panted between desperate noises.

He felt his boxers being pulled off and he looked down to see Julien sitting between his legs, now shirtless – the vampire had pierced nipples. His eyes moved around the room. He couldn’t think about overpowering Julien, but he might be able to get to his phone and call Vena. Then he remembered that he had left it-… He had to bring his hand up to his mouth to keep from screaming out in surprised pain as a wet finger made its way into his back entrance. At least mindless Julien had enough decency to stretch him out before raping him.

“Please stop.” He managed to beg again before the vampire started to piston the digit in and out of his ass. Mason had, of course done this to himself a time or two, so it didn’t take long before the pain made way to pleasure. He had never been brave enough to add a second or a third, so it took a little longer to adjust to those, despite Julien’s mouth around his dick.

Julien was pretty skilled with his mouth, way more skilled than the chick who gave him his only other blow job in eighth grade, but it wasn’t good enough to stop him from desperately trying to push him off. It was also terrifying. Mason could feel the fangs brush along the side of his dick and he imagined that if he struggled too much he might accidently get one through his dick.

Mason came suddenly and violently. He jolted up and made a broken cry as Julien’s fingers flexed into the spot. When Julien pulled away, the human watched as his own cum dripped down his chin, mixing with the dried blood. Mason’s eyes moved to see Julien’s hand fumbling with his jeans. He closed them in terror; it wasn’t over.

He only opened them when he felt the tip of Julien’s dick press against his hole. It was wet: Julien must’ve come in his pants. “J-Julien… P-Please don’t…” It was hard to talk with his brain still jumbled from his orgasm, and while Julien was kissing him again. The kiss was rougher than the first, demanding, and involving fangs. Mason had to open his mouth and deepen the kiss as Julien’s member pushed inside of him.

They were both making breathy moans as the vampire rocked in and out of the human’s body. Mason hoped they didn’t wake up his mother: it would be hard enough to face her without her knowing about it. He occasionally managed to ask Julien to stop, but the vampire just kissed him and changed the pace as if he thought ‘no, stop’ meant ‘more more’. Julien held onto Mason’s elbow and the first time Mason felt the extreme sensation it took him until the second one to realize that their marks were touching and it was just the feeling of being there and together.

Mason came two times and had tear trails running every direction down his face before he felt Julien let go and filled him up. The vampire came with tense, heavy breaths. His eyes were closed tightly as he thrust even deeper into Mason through his orgasm. When he finally finished, he stopped and opened his eyes.

Julien’s eyes were back to their brilliant violet and it had Mason crying again as realization bled into them. He brought one of his hands up to touch Mason’s cheek, but the human instinctively turned away from the touch.

“M-Mason…” With watering eyes, he pulled out of Mason slowly, a sickening pop sound being made as the contact was broken. “Fuck, I’m so sorry…”

Mason opened his mouth but found he had neither the words nor the strength to speak them. He just closed his eyes and clenched his fists. He felt Julien get off him and heard him zip his pants up. He didn’t hear the vampire leave, but he knew he was gone.

When he finally had the strength to move, he got out of bed, his ass in serious pain, and walked into the bathroom. His eyes fell on his phone sitting on the top of the toilet and he picked it up. Vena sounded like she had been asleep when she answered the phone. He needed her too much to care. “C-can you come over?”

There was a long pause where he could hear the silent ‘why?’ and ‘do you have any idea what time it is?’, but he knew she heard the pain in his voice. “I’ll be over soon.”

“The window’s already open…”

Mason was sitting on the shower floor when he heard someone step on the squeaky board under his window. He let out a sob before calling out to Vena. Through the sound of the water, he heard movement around his bedroom and it took a while before she came into the bathroom.

“I grabbed you some clean clothes.” Her voice was shaky and he winced with guilt. He shouldn’t’ve asked her of all people to come help him.

“Thanks… I’m sorry.” He slowly pulled himself up, looking over himself to find bruises from Julien’s just too hard grip on his body.

“Don’t ever apologize… not for this. It’s not your fault.” He could see her silhouette move closer to the door through the shower curtain. “Where do you keep your spare sheets?”

Once he told her, he didn’t hear her leave to go out to the hall closet to get them. As he got dressed, he heard the sound of sheets being snapped as Vena remade his bed.

She was sitting on his bed when he walked out. Her smile was soft as she nodded for him to join her on the bed. Mason curled up next to her, resting his head on her shoulder. Vena flinched at the touch, but wrapped an arm around him.

“I’m sor-…” Vena shook him slightly, glaring at him. He sighed and brought his legs up to his chest. “Thank you for coming so late.”

“You needed me, besides, I _am_ a creature of the night.”

They were quiet for several minutes before Mason started crying again. “I don’t know what to do.”

“Do you want to talk about it?” Vena looked like she really didn’t want him to talk about it. Mason figured she got the big picture of what happened from his sheets.

“I’m just so confused.” He pulled away from her to rub at his face. “I-I thought…”

“He’s going to pay for this, I don’t care who he is…” She said it firmly, probably planning the prince’s death to be a painful one.

“It’s not what you think! It wasn’t really Julien.” Mason didn’t know what he wanted but it certainly wasn’t Julien’s death. Vena stared at him, because of course it was Julien, the room probably stank of him. “He was like those vampires that attacked us.”

“Julien Cardia went crazy? That doesn’t sound like him, I mean…”

“He was pretty much unresponsive. I don’t think he had any idea what I was saying, that I was telling him to stop.” Mason sighed and moved to curl up under her arm again. “When he finally… he looked as terrified about it as I was.”

Vena took in a sharp breath and closed her eyes. “Like he had just been raped too?”

“Yeah. So, I don’t know what to do. I can’t just forgive him and move on, because it was still him… but I can’t blame him because it wasn’t _him_. What would you do?”

“Me? I don’t know. I’ve never been in a situation like yours. I’ve never had feelings for someone that attacked me.”

Mason was blushing from where his face was buried in her shoulder. “He kissed me.”

“While he wasn’t in control of himself?”

“Yeah.”

Vena smiled at him and put her hand on his cheek gently. “I know how you feel about him, it won’t be easy, but maybe you can… I don’t know, but if you still feel that way about him, maybe you should still try.”

“How do you…”

“I drank your blood remember?” Vena glanced at the clock. “It’s late, you should get some sleep.”

He frowned at her as she started fluffing pillows and turning down the comforter. “I don’t know if I can.”

“I’ll stay until you fall asleep.” Her smile was small and soft.

Once he was snug under the covers, she laid facing him. She ran her fingers through his hair with a smile. “Everything’ll be better tomorrow.”

“You promise?”

She snorted out a laugh. “It’s Peirce’s line, so if it’s not, we’ll take it out on him.”

He laughed with her and closed his eyes. “Does he do this for you, lay with you when you can’t sleep?”

“Sometimes. I used to be terrified of what he would do when I fell asleep, but I trust him enough now that even when my paranoia is telling me to make him go away I let him stay.”

“You still haven't said anything to him.”

“There's been too much going on lately, I wouldn't know how to start. You have enough on your plate, get some sleep.” She kissed his forehead.

She started humming a tune he didn’t recognize, but he smiled anyway. He slowly drifted to sleep. When he opened his eyes to the sound of his alarm going off the next morning, Vena was gone.


	17. Chapter 17

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So, I have no idea how, but there's like a thousand word difference between the posted fic and my word document, and I'm just really confused and concerned that an integral moment didn't make it here.

His door opened and he groaned, pulling the covers up over his head. His mother should not have still been there. “I’m getting a little bit of a late start myself, but your friend Vena’s downstairs, says she’s going to give you a ride to school?”

Mason pulled the covers down and looked at her for a while before nodding. “Thanks Mom, I’ll be down in a second.”

“I’ll be getting home early tomorrow, we should sit down and talk, really talk, okay?” She smiled at him before shutting the door. He could hear her walk downstairs and say something to Vena before hearing the door open and shut.

A few minutes later he still hadn’t gotten out of bed and his door opened again. Vena knelt beside the bed, staring at him. He stared back at her, unsure of what to say.

“You don’t have to go today and if you want, I’ll stay here with you.”

“No, I want to go. It feels normal. I just need to actually work up my courage.”

“Okay, how… how… are you okay? He didn’t hurt you too much, did he?”

 “I feel sore, a few bruises, and the bite feels…” He looked away from her as he spoke. “But I’m okay.”

She ran a hand through his hair with a smile. “I’m glad. I’ll be downstairs then.”

“Wait, you didn’t tell Peirce… right?” Mason reached for her hand as she turned to leave.

“Of course not. He’s not even here, I took the car today. It isn’t mine to tell.”

Once he came downstairs, Vena walked towards him. She reached for his necktie and started adjusting it. Once she was satisfied, she took a step back with a frown. “You look really pale.”

Mason didn’t say anything as he put his bookbag on his shoulder. Vena nodded and headed out the door.

The drive was silent and when they walked into school, Fox and Claudette stopped laughing at whatever when the two of them walked over to them.

“Who died?” Fox looked between them.

“It’s… All this craziness is finally catching up to me… I’m going to head to class…” Mason looked down as he walked away.

Claudette looked at Vena, who just watched him walk through the crowd. “He does know werewolves can tell when someone is lying right? It has to do with Julien, doesn’t it?”

“If he wants to tell you, he will. Right now, he just needs some normalcy, so don’t push him.” Vena sighed, giving her brother a pointed glare. Fox put his hands up defensively.

Mason was mostly quiet through the day, but he tried to be normal, tried laughing at Fox’s jokes. Fox and Claudette were doing their best to keep up their normal antics as well, because Vena was.

“I’ll drop you off, but I have to do something so…” Vena ran her hands through her hair as they were leaving for the day.

He looked over at Fox, who shrugged. “I can’t go to your place; I need to watch Jenny… But Alex and Mom won’t be there, you could come over to my place.”

“Will Blaine be there?” Mason made a face, which made Vena smile.

“He won’t bug us, and he probably won’t be there the entire time. Jenny’s been asking about you, I think you have an admirer.”

“Then it’s settled, I’ll drop you boys off at Fox’s, and you can call me later to pick you up. I should be free by the time you’d want to leave.” Vena grinned at both of them.

Fox just stared at his sister with a stupid expression as she walked ahead of them. Mason looked at him, confused.

“It’s really good to see her smile again, to hang out with her again.” Fox smiled at Mason. “Thank you.”

“I didn’t do anything.” Mason huffed as he sped up to catch up to Vena.

 

When Fox and Mason walked into the rather large, but disorganized house, Mason heard Jenny yell her brother’s name as she ran towards them. She ran towards them, hugging Fox tightly. She looked up at Mason in awe when she finally released the hunter, taking his hand.

“Can we play?”

“Yeah, sure for a little while at least.” Mason smiled back at her. Fox gave him a daring smile but didn’t say anything as he headed up the stairs.

Jenny jumped up and down as she took his hand, dragging him towards another room. When Fox finally found them, Jenny was standing on a small table, laughing maniacally with a bed sheet tied around her shoulders and wild glasses. Mason was holding a foam sword and play glaring at her. Neither of them even noticed him, as he watched them play out the scene, with Mason finally slaying the evil Jenny. As she dramatically fell from the table, Fox grabbed her and grinned at her.

She grinned back. “It’s official, Mason’s a better hunter than you. You should just quit.”

Mason walked over and nudged him. “So, it’s not just Vena who thinks it then.”

“Oh, come on, Mason, man, I’m going to be a great hunter.” Fox gave Mason a look of mock hurt before letting his sister drop a few inches before catching her again.

“I know, but Mason’s better _now._ ” She grinned at him when he put her down. “Anyway, I’m going to color in my room, so you do whatever big kids do.”

Her head was held high as she walked out, the sheet cape billowing behind her. Fox and Mason looked at each other before doubling over, laughing. Fox put his hand on Mason’s shoulder. “Come on, let’s work on some homework.”

While on a snack break, which Jenny took up to her room, Fox was staring at Mason strangely. Mason looked over at him and saw him staring. He sighed and set down his cup. “You want to know what’s up with me.”

“You’ve acted more you since we’ve got here, and it’s okay if you don’t want to tell me…” Fox put his hand back on Mason’s shoulder, ducking his head to look at Mason’s face. “But, it’s about Julien isn’t it?”

Mason tensed at the mention of the name. He had managed to go all day without hearing it and it he didn’t know that it would hurt so much to hear it after what happened. The mark one the inside of his elbow throbbed, and he pulled away as he put gripped it with his other hand.

“Mason, I’m here for you, you can trust me.” Fox dropped his hand and Mason could feel the concern rolling off of him, despite not looking at him.

“It’s not something we should talk about where Jenny might walk in.”

Since Fox didn’t say anything, but was moving, Mason assumed he had nodded. He took a deep breath before following him. He looked up when Fox locked the bathroom door. “It’s obviously not good.”

“He… He came to my house last night, and I gave him blood… but he lost control…” Mason could feel tears coming to his eyes and his knees were shaking. “He… he ra-…”

Fox shushed him and wrapped his arms around him before he could finish. “I’m sorry, sorry that he… that…”

Mason buried his face in the hunter’s shoulder. “I don’t know what to do… it wasn’t really him and I still want to…”

“Okay.”

“Shouldn’t you try to talk me out of still trying?” Mason pulled out of the hug, wiping his eyes.

“If you wanted that, you should tell Claudette. She’d probably tell you ‘I told you so’ and rip off his dick.” Fox smiled at him. “I think you should give yourself some time though, you can’t just face him when the pain is so raw.”

Nodding, Mason leaned against the sink edge. “Thank you. You’re a pretty cool guy.”

Fox’s eyes went wide with awe and pride. Mason stared at him, jumping when there was a knock on the door and Jenny asked them what they were doing. Both boys started laughing, which prompted severe confusion from the young girl.


	18. Chapter 18

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So, I was having computer problems. I fixed them, by dropping almost $500 on a new one. It's pretty.

Vena walked through the giant gate in front of the palace; the guards didn’t look at her twice and she didn’t say a word to them, her head held high. The large manor house that the vampire royal family lived in was mostly empty. A few of the servants ducked their heads as they passed her and not one of the guards even glanced her way.

With a deep breath, she started up the stairs, heading towards the private quarters, more specifically Julien’s wing. On her way, Julien’s younger brother, Niles, ran past her excited, almost knocking her over as he yelled out a greeting. His mother, stopped in her chase to apologize on her son’s behalf.

“It’s alright, your highness.” Vena managed to smile at the distraught looking woman. “But you should probably try to catch him before he knocks over a servant carrying something breakable.”

The King’s consort’s face became even more stressed as she raced after her son. Vena turned to watch with a small smile.

When she finally made it to Julien’s wing, a woman, only a year older than her was standing outside of Julien’s bedroom door. She had short platinum blonde hair and was dressed rather skimpily. Vena paused when the woman trained her red eyes at her.

“Princess Sira.” Vena felt herself bowing slightly, trying not to look at the other woman.

Sira took a few steps towards Vena, putting a finger under the younger vampire’s chin to force her face up. “Hello Vena. It has been a while, you seem different.”

Vena felt her face flush as she tried not to make eye contact with the princess. She couldn’t manage to reply.

“But you’re here to see Julien.” Sira took a step back, pouting slightly. “He’s been odd lately, do you know why?”

“Yeah.” Vena finally answered after she realized that she expected to. “I-I… I’m sure he’ll tell…”

“When he’s ready, hmph. I suppose I’ll let you talk to him.” Sira started walking away, but paused just as Vena caught her breath. “I hope I’ll see you again, and you’ll still be _different_.”

Her face was hot again as Sira winked. Vena took a few seconds to compose herself before walking into Julien’s bedroom without knocking or announcing herself. She set her eyes on Julien, sitting against the wall under his window. He didn’t look like he even noticed that she came in.

He didn’t react at all when she walked over and leaned against the wall next to him. It was a few moments before Vena finally spoke.

“You okay?”

Julien reacted to that. He looked like she had just punched him in the face. Vena felt her heart sink as she physically sank down the wall to sit next to him.

“I understand, you know. I’m so mad at you, and I just want to rip your throat out, but I understand.” Vena rested her head against the wall.

He glanced over at her. “Understand what?”

“I know what it’s like to not have control of your body, to hurt someone without wanting to, to have to live with that for the rest of your life.”

“It’s not the same.” He looked away.

“No, it’s not. You love him.”

Julien started sobbing then, the sounds shaking his entire body. Vena reached out and took his hand.

“And now… now I fucked up any chance…” He squeezed her hand hard, burying his face in his knees.

“I wouldn’t be so sure.” Vena smiled at him as he looked up at her, shocked and still crying. She cleared her throat, looking away. “He’s so hurt, and it’ll take time before he’s ready to forgive you. But, he wants to forgive you, he wants to try again.”

Shaking his head, Julien squeezed her hand again. “How, how could… after what I did? I’ll never be able to forgive myself.”

“I don’t have all the answers Julien. You’ll need to talk to him, but he also needs time.”

“I can’t do this. What if I hurt him again? I couldn’t live with myself… He’d be better off without me in his life.”

“Would you be able to live without him? Julien, can you honestly tell me that you were alright without seeing him the last few days?” She squeezed his hand this time. He tensed in response and she sighed. “Julien…”

“Being apart… it hurts so much…” He was sobbing again. “Why’d you have to go and get shot?”

“You could have let me die.”

They were both silent for a while before Julien pulled his hand out of Vena’s finally. She stood up and headed towards the door. As she turned the knob, she heard him say something quietly.

“Thank you.”

She didn’t respond as she left the castle. Once she got to Pierce’s car, she put her head on the steering wheel and cried herself.

 

“You okay?” Fox asked as he leaned on the car, looking in the open window. Vena glanced up at him, unlocking the door for the third time since Mason kept opening the door at the same time as she unlocked it.

“I have no idea what you’re talking about.”

“You look all hot and bothered. Something happen?” Fox motioned over her and she glanced at Mason, who was now fighting with the seatbelt.

Mason looked up at her and grimaced. “He’s right, you also look like you were crying earlier.”

“I stopped by the palace.” Vena replied simply, her hands tightening on the steering wheel.

“It’s okay, I told him.” Mason was so quiet when he said it that Vena probably wouldn’t have heard him without superhearing.

“You give the prince a good talking to?” Fox ducked down, shoving his head through the open window.

“We talked. He’s in really rough shape.” She looked over at Mason, who was paler than he was only a few seconds ago. “He feels terrible about what happened.”

“Well, he kind of should, but the flustered part? Did he put the moves on you? Because I was under the impression Julien was strictly into dick.”

Vena blinked at her younger brother before glancing at Mason, who looked like he was going to puke. “Goodbye Fox.” Then she started putting the window up.

He squeaked with surprise, moving faster than Mason had ever seen him. Once the window was up and his neck was safe, he hit the window. Vena rolled her eyes, not looking at him as she pulled away from the curb.

Mason cleared his throat when they were farther away from Fox’s house. “So, what did happen?”

She let out a breath. “Not a lot of people know this, but Julien’s sister and I used to…” Clearing her throat, she reached down to shift gears.

“You used to date?”

“Not date, it was mostly sex. We tried to keep anything else out of it, because of our positions.” Vena glanced at him. “It’s okay to get around with other species when we’re kids, but actually settling down with something else, that’s not done. Especially if your parents are the heads of your species.”

“I take it you saw her and…”

“She acted like nothing ever happened… We… we were together when I got, so we never got any closure.” Vena shrugged. “I hadn’t thought about her in such a long time.”

“You’re a vampire now, would dating her be a thing you could do?” Mason paused then sighed. “It’s what’s keeping you from telling Peirce.”

“You’re annoyingly perceptive.” Vena gave him an unimpressed and he gave her a sweet smile.

“I just call them how I see them.” He shrugged. “What are you doing when you drop me off?”

“Going to the Hunters’ Headquarters. I have to pick up Peirce, and… and apparently they’re going to start sending me on hunts again.”

“Is that a good thing?”

“I don’t know yet. I’ll let you know after I go on my first one.”

Mason grimace, looking out the window.


	19. Chapter 19

Vena felt watched as she entered headquarters. As a child she had spent most of her time running through the halls, following her father or sword fighting with the other kids, but things had changed since the last time she had entered the building on her own. The guards knew exactly who she was, but they still demanded her to show idea and state her purpose. Her blood was boiling.

But she had to find Peirce. She was still classified as an apprentice and he was still her mentor, so he was required to attend any meetings that she had. It was a comfort though, having Peirce there to stand next to her as she stood in front of a room full of people that used to be like her family but now hated her.

“Hi, I’m looking for Peirce, Peirce Gestalt?” Vena walked up to one of the reception desks. The woman that looked up at her and Vena recognized her as a hunter that she should have graduated with. She couldn’t quiet remember her name, but she knew it started with a L.

“Oh… Vena…” The woman looked shocked, but quickly cleared her throat, pulling up something on the computer. “He’s not scheduled for anything at the moment, but I’d check either his office or the cells.”

“Thank you.” She nodded, moving away from the desk. It was unlikely that Peirce was at his desk. He’d spend days talking about how much he hated his office. The idea of going down to the cells made her cringe though, knowing what was down there.

 “Peirce?” Vena called as she walked towards the guard both, until she was hit was a familiar scent. Her nose wrinkled at it was she approached the door. Standing next to it, she knocked on the door, repeating his name.

Inside she heard tripping, and swearing, and something like a howl. She was almost amused when he came out, his face still flushed.

“Vena… I wasn’t… you’re… uh…” Peirce coughed, looking away from her.

Her eyes went to the other person that walked out behind her mentor. He was tall, sun darkened skin and bright blue eyes that refused to meet hers. The distinct scent of werewolf (and butt sex) rolled off of him. “Gavner Ethans. Claudette mentioned that you were working here now.”

“You guys know each other?” Peirce ran a hand through his hair which must have fallen out of its ponytail.

“We used to be best friends, and then… the rest is history.” Vena’s eyes were still locked on the werewolf.

“I’m sorry.” Gavner said, not looking at Vena. “I… I…”

“I’m not mad. It was harder without you, but I understand.” Vena smiled at him. “Though, you don’t have any better taste in men, that’s for damned sure.”

Gavner looked at her and grinned back at her. “I’m just trying to fuck my way to a higher paid position.”

Peirce crossed his arms, looking thoroughly offended.

“You need to clean yourself up before my meeting. I’m sure they’re used to you going to your meetings like that, but this is about me.” Vena glanced at the man, who rolled his eyes.

“Meet me in my office in half an hour.” Peirce grumbled something under his breath as he walked away.

Vena looked back at Gavner. “Half an hour isn’t a long time to catch up.”

“I can’t really leave here when I’m on duty either.” Gavner rubbed the back of his neck. “And honestly, you probably shouldn’t be down here.”

Vena looked at the giant metal door that separate the cells filled with criminal vampire and werewolves from the rest of the building. Something buzzed through her that made her take a step back. “Yeah, probably not.”

“You going to be okay? Do I need to…”

“No, I’ll be okay to stay here for a little while, but…” She looked up at him. “Why’d you take this job?”

“To protect you.”

“If you weren’t gay I’d say you were coming onto me.” Vena punched his shoulder with a smile.

He looked shocked. “I didn’t think you…”

“I’ve made a lot of progress in a short time recently. I have a new best friend.” Vena smiled softly. “A human.”

“How did you even meet a human? And since when do you hang out with my sister?”

“Like I said,” she leaned against the wall. “You should come by some time. It… it’ll be good, as long as you don’t do Peirce.”

“Is there a problem with me… are you jealous?” Gavner took a step towards her. “You are, aren’t you?”

Her face was heating up and she looked down. No wonder she was so drawn to Mason, he was just like Gavner.

“Vena, does he know?”

“How many people are going to give me this lecture today?” Vena groaned, glancing at him. “It’s complicated.”

“He says your name sometimes when we fuck. How could it possibly be complicated?”

Vena doubled over, tears filling her eyes as he chest constricted. She felt like she was going to throw up. Her vison was blurring and she could make out the distorted words that Gavner was yelling at her as fell to the ground.

It got worse over the few minutes until Peirce was kneeling in front of her, taking her face in his hands. He was talking but the pounding in her ears was drowning out the meaning. She broke her shaking hands up and gripped his arms tightly. There was panic in his eyes too before he pulled her into a hug, kissing the top of her head.

Finally she had calmed down enough to notice that Gavner had gone and she could hear something other than her heartbeat and the panicked words in her head she had no control over. Peirce’s heart was beating almost as fast as hers was, and he was crying.

She took a shaky breath before pulling away slightly. “Sorry.”

“You don’t have to be sorry, I… I should…” He looked in her face and she couldn’t read his. “I-I… I’m sorry.”

“Why… are you…” When she could finally read shame, she looked away. Ganver told him at the very least what he had said to send her into a panic attack. It had been weeks since she had one. “It’s not… Peirce…”

“I didn’t want you to find out this way.” He moved his hands off her and she felt cold without his touch. “I understand if…”

“Peirce, I knew. I’ve known for a while.” She reached out to him, her hand on his neck. He made a surprised sound. Vena took a deep breath before she moved her hand under the collar of his shirt, reaching to touch the scar she had left the first time she had ever bitten him. Peirce let out a needy whimper when her fingers touched where she had marked him. “It’s in your blood.”

He brought his hand up to put on top of hers. “And you’re…”

“I wouldn’t be here right now without. You are everything to me, how you feel about isn’t going to change how much I need you.” She leaned a little closer. “It was just how he said it, so bluntly… I guess.”

Peirce put his free hand back on her cheek. “So, it’s okay? It’s okay that I love you?”

She nodded, putting more pressure on the scars.

“Vena, I love you.”

“Peirce…” Vena pulled her hand away. “I-I… I can’t… I want to… but I can’t, not right now…”

“You want to?” Peirce smiled at her softly. “That’s more than I could’ve ever hoped for.”

“But it’s okay that…”

“Of course.” He pulled her into a hug. “I know that you can’t, that you might never, but I’m going to be right here, just the same as I have been.”

“Thank you.” She rested her head against his shoulder. “We have to get to that meeting.”

Peirce groaned before pulling her up. “Are you sure you wouldn’t rather just cuddle here?”

“You smell like sex, and the pull to go through that door is getting stronger. Let’s cuddle more later, at home, after you shower.” She pushed his gently and he just smiled wildly at her.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Wow, this conversation happened quicker than I was originally planning. Sometimes stories really just do what they want.


End file.
